Human Liberation - an Islamic Renaissance

Who is Dr. Israr Ahmad?

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Dr. Israr Ahmad
(Lecture at Khilafah Confrence 1994, Wembley Hall, London)

The Founder of Tanzeem-e-Islami Dr. Israr Ahmad is a well-known figure in Pakistan, the Middle East, and North America for his efforts in drawing the attention of Muslims in general and their educated classes in particular towards the teachings and wisdom of the Holy Qur'an. As against the detached, cool, and sterile academicism of many contemporary Muslim scholars, Dr. Israr Ahmad firmly believes in the methodology of “reflection-through-action” which he thinks is amply supported by a verse of the Holy Qur'an:

As for those who strive in Us, We surely guide them to Our paths (Al-Ankabut 29:69)

Dr. Israr Ahmad, was born on April 26, 1932 in Hisar (a district of East Punjab, now a part of Haryana State) in India. He graduated from King Edward Medical College (Lahore) in 1954 and later received his masters in Islamic Studies from the University of Karachi in 1965. He came under the influence of Allama Iqbal and Maulana Maududi as a young student, worked briefly for Muslim Student's Federation in the Independence Movement and, following the creation of Pakistan in 1947, for the Islami Jami`yat-e-Talaba and then for the Jama`at-e-Islami. Dr. Israr Ahmad resigned from the Jama`at in April 1957 because of its involvement in the electoral politics, which he believed was irreconcilable with the revolutionary methodology adopted by the Jama'at in the pre-1947 period.

While still a student and an activist of the Islami Jami`yat-e-Talaba, Dr. Israr Ahmad gained considerable fame and eminence as a Mudarris (or teacher) of the Holy Qur'an. Even after resigning from the Jama`at, he continued to give Qur'anic lectures in different cities of Pakistan, and especially after 1965 he has, according to his own disclosure, invested the better part of his physical and intellectual abilities in the learning and teaching of the Qur'anic wisdom.Dr. Israr Ahmad wrote an extremely significant tract in 1967 in which he explained his basic thought that an Islamic Renaissance is possible only by revitalizing the Iman (true faith and certitude) among the Muslims, particularly their intelligentsia. The revitalization of Iman, in turn, is possible only by the propagation of the Qur'anic teachings and presenting the everlasting wisdom of the Book of Allah (SWT) in contemporary idiom and at the highest level of scholarship. This undertaking is essential in order to remove the existing dichotomy between modern physical and social sciences on the one hand and the knowledge revealed by Almighty Allah (SWT) on the other. This tract is available in English as Islamic Renaissance: The Real Task Ahead.Dr. Israr Ahmad gave up his thriving medical practice in 1971 in order to launch a full-fledged and vigorous movement for the revival of Islam. As a result of his efforts, the Markazi Anjuman Khuddam-ul-Qur'an Lahore was established in 1972, Tanzeem-e-Islami was founded in 1975, and Tahreek-e-Khilafat Pakistan was launched in 1991.

Dr. Israr Ahmad first appeared on Pakistan Television in 1978 in a program called Al-Kitab; this was followed by other programs, known as Alif Lam Meem, Rasool-e-Kamil, Umm-ul-Kitab and the most popular of all religious programs in the history of Pakistan Television, the Al-Huda, which made him a household name throughout the country. Although he did not like to receive it personally, Dr. Israr Ahmad was awarded Sitara-e-Imtiaz in 1981. He has to his credit over 60 Urdu books on topics related to Islam and Pakistan, 9 of which have been translated into English.

In the context of Qur'anic exegesis and understanding, Dr. Israr Ahmad is a firm traditionalist of the genre of Maulana Mehmood Hassan Deobandi and Allama Shabeer Ahmad Usmani; yet he presents Qur'anic teachings in a scientific and enlightened way, being also a disciple of Allama Iqbal and Dr. Muhammad Rafiuddin, and also because of his own background in science and medicine. Concerning the internal coherence of and the principles of deep reflection in the Qur'an, he has essentially followed the thinking of Maulana Hameed Uddin Farahi and Maulana Ameen Ahsan Islahi, though even here he has further developed their line of argument. Dr. Israr Ahmad believes in a dynamic and revolutionary conception of Islam, and in this regard he is a disciple of Maulana Abul Kalam Azad and Maulana Sayyid Abul A`la Maududi.

For the last forty years or so, Dr. Israr Ahmad has been actively engaged not only in reviving the Qur'an-centered Islamic perennial philosophy and world-view but also reforming the society in a practical way with the ultimate objective of establishing a true Islamic State, or the System of Khilafah. He has widely traveled abroad and the audio and video tapes of his Qur'anic discourses in Urdu and English languages have circulated in thousands throughout the world.

A master's thesis, entitled Dr. Israr Ahmad's Political Thought and Activities, was written by Ms. Shagufta Ahmad in the Islamic Studies department of Canada's Mac Gill University. This thesis is available from Markazi Anjuman Khuddam-ul-Qur'an Lahore.

Who is Sayyid Qutb?

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Sayyid Qutb (9 October 1906 in Musha – executed on 29 August 1966) was an important theoretician of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood.

Alternative spellings of his "first" and "last" names include Syed, Koteb (rather common), Qutub, etc. Arabic: سيد قطب

He first received a religious education; in 1920, he moved to Cairo, where he received a Western education between 1929 and 1933, before starting his career as a teacher in the Ministry of Public Instruction. During his early career, Qutb devoted himself to literature as an author and critic, writing such novels as Ashwak (Thorns) and even elevating Egyptian novelist Naguib Mahfouz from obscurity. In 1939, he became a functionary in Egypt's Ministry of Education (wizarat al-ma'arif); from 1948 to 1950, he went to the United States on a scholarship to study the educational system, receiving a master's degree from the Colorado State College of Education (now the University of Northern Colorado). Qutb's first major theoretical work of religious social criticism, Al-'adala al-Ijtima'iyya fi-l-Islam (Social Justice in Islam), was published in 1949, during his time overseas.

The perceived racism, materialism, and 'loose' sexual conduct that he saw in the United States is believed by some to have been the impetus for his rejection of Western values and his move towards radicalism upon returning to Egypt. Resigning from the civil service he became perhaps the most persuasive publicist of the Muslim Brotherhood. The school of thought he inspired has become known as Qutbism.

The Muslim Brotherhood, and Qutb in particular, enjoyed a close relationship with the Free Officers Movement in the time leading up to and following the coup of June 1952. But their early cooperation soon soured over such issues as the Free Officers' refusal to hold elections, to ban alcohol, or to take a hard line against the British presence in Egypt.

After the attempted assassination of Gamal Abdel Nasser in 1954, the Egyptian government cracked down on the Muslim Brotherhood, imprisoning Qutb along with many others. While in prison, Qutb wrote his two most important works: a commentary of the Qur'an Fi zilal al-Qur'an (In the Shade of the Quran), and a manifesto of political Islam called Ma'alim fi-l-Tariq (Milestones).

His commentary on the Qur'an has been extremely influential; some see him as the central theorist of twentieth-century Islamism. There is anecdotal evidence that Sayyid Qutb and Shaykh Taqi-ud-deen an-Nabhani founder of Hizb-ut-Tahrir, influenced each other. According to Daniel Benjamin and Steven Simon, "In a century in which some of the most important writing came out of prisons, Qutb, for better or for worse, is the Islamic world's answer to Solzhenitsyn, Sartre, and Havel, and he easily ranks with all of them in influence. It was Sayyid Qutb who fused together the core elements of modern Islamism.... Qutb concluded that the unity of God and His sovereignty meant that human rule – government legislates its own behavior – is illegitimate. Muslims must answer to God alone." [Daniel Benjamin and Steven Simon, The Age of Sacred Terror: Radical Islam's War Against America (New York: Random House, 2002) p. 62] ISBN 0812969847. This point is central to most modern Islamists, in their assertion that all forms of governance over Muslims are illegitimate except the Islamic state Khilafah.

One of Qutb's main ideas was applying the term Jahiliyya, which originally referred to humanity's state of ignorance before the revelation of Islam, to modern-day Muslim societies. In his view, turning away from Islamic law and Islamic values under the influence of European imperialism had left the Muslim world in a condition of debased ignorance, similar to that of the pre-Islamic era (or Jahiliyya).

The conditions he experienced in prison, it has been argued, pushed Qutb to the conclusion that the Egyptian state was totally illegitimate. Violence against the inmates was commonplace. Sometimes this took the form of torture, but it once climaxed in the murder of 23 Muslim Brothers and the wounding of 46 after a protest in which they refused to perform hard labor. This incident, according to some, transformed Qutb’s view of the Nasser government, which he considered to be unparalleled in its cruelty. His radicalization culminated in a little book published in 1964 which was based on the ideas he had written in notes and letters during his time in prison. This is the famous Ma'alim fi-l-Tariq.

Qutb was let out of prison at the end of 1964 at the behest of the then Prime Minister of Iraq, Abdul Salam Arif, for only 8 months before being rearrested in August 1965. He was accused of plotting to overthrow the state and subjected to what some consider a show trial which culminated in a death sentence for him and six other members of the Muslim Brotherhood. On 29 August 1966, Sayyid Qutb was executed by hanging.

His brother, Muhammad Qutb, moved to Saudi Arabia where he became a Professor of Islamic Studies. One of Muhammad Qutb's students and ardent followers was Ayman Zawahiri, who was to become the mentor of Osama bin Laden.

Literary works:

Mahammat ash-Sha'ir fi-l-hayat wa-shi'r al-jil al-hadir, 1933
ash-Shati al-majhul, 1935
al-Taswir al-Fanni fi-l-Qu'ran (Artistic Representation in the Qur'an), 1944/45
Tifl min al-qarya (A Child from the Village -- an autobiographical work), 1946

Theoretical works:

Al-'adala al-Ijtima'iyya fi-l-Islam (Social Justice in Islam), 1949, his first theoretical work
Fi zilal al-Qur'an (In the Shade of the Qur'an), 1954, commentary of the Qur'an in 30 volumes, his most important theoretical work. In 1960, a revised edition started to appear which was to remain uncompleted; the last volume appeared in 1964. The commentary is interesting in so far as it is rather innovative in its methodical approach, borrowing heavily from the method of literary interpretation developed by Amin al-Khuli, while retaining some structural features of classical commentaries (for example, the principle of progressing from the first sura to the last).
Ma'alim fi-l-Tariq (Signposts on the Road, or Milestones), 1964, Qutb's best known work, regarded by some as "in many ways mark the beginnings of modern political Islam"

References

Shepard, William E., Sayyid Qutb and Islamic Activism. A Translation and Critical Analysis of "Social Justice in Islam", Leiden 1996
Haddad, Yvonne Y., "Sayyid Qutb: ideologue of Islamic revival", in Esposito, J. (ed.), Voices of the Islamic Revolution, New York 1983

External links

Sayyid Qutb, Milestones (http://www.youngmuslims.ca/online_library/books/milestones/index_2.asp).

Paul Berman, The Philosopher of Islamic Terror (http://members.cox.net/slsturgi3/PhilosopherOfIslamicTerror.htm) New York Times Magazine (March 23, 2003).

Robert Irwin, Is this the man who inspired Bin Laden? (http://www.guardian.co.uk/g2/story/0,3604,584478,00.html) The Guardian (November 1, 2001).

Sayyid Qutb's America (http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=1253796) from NPR's All Things Considered (May 6, 2003).

Liberal movements within Islam

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Reform, not schism

It should be noted that these are movements within Islam, rather than an attempt at schism. As such, they believe in the basic tenets of Islam, such as the Six Elements of Belief and the Five Pillars of Islam. They consider their views to be fully compatible with the teachings of Islam. Their main difference with more conservative Islamic opinion is in differences of interpretation of how to apply the core Islamic values to modern life.

It should be further noted that the liberal Muslim's focus on individual interpretation and ethics, rather than on the literal word of scripture, may have an antecedent in the Sufi tradition of Islamic mysticism.

Contemporary and controversial Issues

Over the course of the 19th and 20th centuries, in accordance with their increasingly modern societies and outlooks, liberal Muslims have tended to reinterpret many aspects of their religion. This is particularly true of Muslims who now find themselves living in non-Muslim countries. Such people may describe themselves variously as liberal, progressive or reformist; but rather than implying a specific agenda, these terms tend to incorporate a broad spectrum of views which contest medievalist and traditional interpretations of Islam in many different ways. Although there is no full consensus amongst liberal Muslims on their views, they tend to agree on some or all of the following beliefs:

Most liberal Muslims consider Islam's notion of absolute equality of all humanity to be one of its central concepts. Human rights is thus a major concern for most liberals. Many Muslim majority countries have signed international human rights treaties, but the impact of these largely remains to be seen in local legal systems. The Qur'anic story of Adam is sometimes interpreted to support human rights.
Feminism is likewise a major issue. For this reason, liberal Muslims are often critical of traditional Islamic laws which allow polygamy for men but not women. It is also accepted by most liberal Muslims that a woman may lead the state, and that women should not be segregated from men in society or in mosques. Many liberal Muslims accept that a woman may lead group prayers, despite the custom for women to pray behind or in a balcony, able to see men but not be seen themselves. However, this issue remains controversial; see Women as imams. Some Muslim feminists are also opposed to the traditional requirements of the veil (commonly called hijab), claiming that any modest clothing is sufficiently Islamic for both men and women.
Many liberal Muslims favor the idea of modern democracy with separation of church and state, and thus support secular governments. The existence or applicability of Islamic law is thus questioned by liberals. Their argument often involves variants of the Mu'tazili theory that the Qur'an is created by God for the particular circumstances of the early Muslim community, and reason must be used to apply it to new contexts.
This means that liberal Muslims often drop traditional interpretations of the Qur'an which they find too conservative, preferring instead readings which are more adaptable to modern society. Most liberal Muslims reject derivation of Islamic laws from literal readings of single Qur'anic verses. They generally claim that a holistic view which takes into account the 7th century Arabian cultural context negates such literal interpretations. For example, some liberals may tolerate homosexuality even though conservatives forbid it. However, this topic remains highly controversial even amongst Muslim liberals; see Islamic views of homosexuality.
The reliability and applicability of Hadith literature is questioned by liberals, as much of traditional Islamic law derives from it.
Most liberal Muslims consequently do not believe in the authority of traditional scholars to issue a fatwa, since they generally favour the individual's ability to interpret Islamic sacred texts on their own.
Tolerance is another major issue. Liberal Muslims are generally open to interfaith dialogue and differences, particularly in the case of the Ahmadi and other controversies with Jews, Christians, Hindus, etc.
Liberal Muslims also tend to oppose the idea of jihad as armed struggle, and tend to prefer ideals such as non-violence. The Qur'anic figure of Abel seems to support the idea that anyone who dies as a result of refusing to commit violence is forgiven of their sins.
Liberal Muslims tend to be skeptical about the validity of Islamization of knowledge (including Islamic economics, Islamic science and Islamic philosophy) as separate from mainstream fields of enquiry. This is usually due to the often secular outlook of Muslim liberals, which makes them more disposed to trust mainstream secular scholarship. They may also regard the propagation of these fields as merely a propaganda move by Muslim conservatives.
Liberals are also less likely to treat Qur'anic narratives of Adam, Noah, Abraham, Jesus and other prophets of Islam as historical fact. Instead some liberals view these as moral stories meant to reinforce the ethical message of Islam. Such liberals tend to accept scientific ideas such as evolution and secular history, and are generally opposed to the idea of Islamic history.

In North America

The launch of the Progressive Muslim Union of North America (http://www.pmuna.org/) (PMUNA) in October 2004 exposed fissures within the liberal and progressive movements. One the one hand, PMUNA has come under fire from Muslims on the left; they tended to believe the organization failed to sufficiently distance itself from a U.S.-centric and neoconservative-inspired imperialist agenda, which seeks to define an "acceptable" Muslim as a liberal, pro-American and uncritical of Israel. On the other progressive Muslims with more traditional leanings criticize links between PMUNA and the controversial Muslim Wake Up! (http://www.muslimwakeup.com/) website, which supported the French hijab ban and carries articles hostile to the conservative Muslim perspective.

These differences came to head in March 2005, when PMUNA/MWU sponsored a mixed-gender Jummah led by a woman, Professor Amina Wadud of Victoria Commonwealth University. Opponents of this heavily publicised event argue that reform should be restricted to social matters, and that matters of worship (ibadah)are not open to reform.

Islam and Anarchism.

In the last few years, there has been talk knocking about on the idea of Islamic Anarchism, primarily from the US-based punk Muslim Michael Knight (http://www.muslimwakeup.com/events/archives/2005/02/mike_knight_on.php). But there has been sparse evidence of any coherent online presence of Muslim Anarchists, until June 20th, 2005, when Yakoub Islam, a British-based Muslim, published his online Muslim Anarchist Charter (http://www.bayyinat.org.uk/manarchist.htm).

The charter asserted a set of basic principles for Anarchist thought and action founded on a Muslim perspective. These reaffirm some of the core principles of Islam, including a belief in God, the Prophecy of Muhammad (peace be upon him) and the human soul, but assert the possibility that a Muslim's spiritual path might be achieved by refusing to compromise with institutional power in any form, be it judicial, religious, social, corporate or political. Muslims are thus challenged to establish a society where spiritual growth is "uninhibited by tyranny, poverty and ignorance". It is in the fervent assertion of the principle of no compromise, driven by a utopian vision of humanity living in peace and co-operation, that the faith of Islam and the politics of Anarchism are said to meet.

Yakoub, formerly Julian Anderson, originally discovered Anarchism in the 1980s through the works of the punk band CRASS, but distanced himself from the anti-religious, drug-enfeebled British punk Muslim scene in the late 1980s to explore academic learning, eventually converting to Islam in 1991. A lack of commitment and understanding saw him retreat from religious practice during 1990s, returning to Islam only at the turn of the Millennium when he began working with Muslim children in inner city schools. Over the last 18 months, Yakoub has become an increasingly visible cyber activist at the same time as caring for his 12 year old son, who is profoundly autistic.

Almost from the beginning of his journey into the Muslim faith, Yakoub was disturbed by the authoritarianism dogging much Islamic thought and practice. After discovering the writings of the radical progressive Muslim Farid Esack (http://uk.geocities.com/faridesack/), Yakoub began to explore anti-authoritarian interpretations of Islam, and consequently initiated an online project based on Carolyn Ellis's (http://sobek.colorado.edu/SOC/SI/si-ellis.htm) concept of autoethnography called TGP (http://www.bayyinat.org.uk/tgpex.htm).

Yakoub is cautious in describing himself as a Muslim Anarchist (or an Anarchist Muslim), rather than talking about Islamic Anarchism, because the evidence from social research points to a considerable diversity within the Muslim community or ummah, with some anthropologists reluctant to talk about a single 'Islam'. Neither is there, of course, a single 'Anarchism', and the publication of the Muslim Anarchist charter marks the beginning of an intellectual and political discussion, rather than the creation of a new political or religious ideology, insha Allah.

External links

International Coalition Against Political Islam (http://www.icapi.org)
No to Political Islam (http://www.ntpi.org)
Progressive Muslim Union (http://pmuna.org/) of North America
Muslim Wake Up! (http://muslimwakeup.com/index.php) Online progressive Muslim magazine
alt.muslim (http://www.altmuslim.com) Progressive Muslim news forum
LiberalIslam.net (http://www.liberalislam.net/) by Zeeshan Hasan
Ijtihad.org (http://www.ijtihad.org/) by Muqtedar Khan
AMILA (http://www.amila.org/) American Muslims Intent on Learning and Activism
QALANDAR Islam and Interfaith Relations in South Asia (http://www.islaminterfaith.org/) by Yoginder Sikand
Islamic Liberal group (http://www.islamlib.com/en/page.php) website from Indonesia
Charles Kurzman's Liberal Islam links (http://www.unc.edu/~kurzman/LiberalIslamLinks.htm) compiled by the author of Liberal Islam: A Sourcebook (published 1998 by Oxford University Press, USA. ISBN 0195116224).
Muslim Refusenik (http://www.muslim-refusenik.com) website of Irshad Manji, author of "The Trouble with Islam."
Sir Sayyid Ahmad Khan (http://www.cis-ca.org/voices/k/syydkhn.htm)
Muhammad Ali of Egypt (http://www.infoplease.com/ce6/people/A0834351.html)
Al-Fatiha Foundation (http://www.al-fatiha.net) dedicated to lesbian, gay and bisexual Muslims.
Free Muslims Against Terrorism (http://www.freemuslims.org)
Tasneem Project -TGP (http://www.bayyinat.org.uk/index.html) Yakoub Islam's Anarchist Muslim website.
Under the Cover of Islam (http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/18/opinion/18manji.html?ex=1258520400&en=61d49ccf6bb1077f&ei=5090&partner=rssuserland) - A New York Times op-ed by Irshad Manji about Liberal Islam in North America and Europe.
"'I Exist' and 'In the Name of Allah': Documentaries on Gay and Lesbian Arabs and Muslims" (http://montages.blogspot.com/2005/01/i-exist-and-in-name-of-allah.html)

References

Progressive Muslims: On Justice, Gender, and Pluralism by Omid Safi. ISBN 185168316X
Unveiling Traditions: Postcolonial Islam in a Polycentric World by Anouar Majid
Qur'an, Liberation and Pluralism by Farid Esack
The Unthought in Contemporary Islamic Thought, by Mohammed Arkoun
Liberal Islam: A Sourcebook Edited by Charles Kurzman
Revival and Reform in Islam by Fazlur Rahman
American Muslims: Bridging Faith and Freedom by M. A. Muqtedar Khan. http://www.ijtihad.org/book1.htm

What is Islamic Philosophy?

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Islamic philosophy is the attempt to fuse the fields of philosophy with the religious teachings of Islam.

As with any fusion of religion and philosophy, the attempt is difficult because classical philosophers start with no preconditions for which conclusions they must reach in their investigation, while classical religious believers have a set of religious principles of faith that they hold one must believe. Indeed, due to these divergent goals and views, some hold that one cannot simultaneously be a philosopher and a true adherent of Islam, which is believed to be a revealed religion by its adherents. In this view, all attempts at synthesis ultimately must fail.

Others, however, hold that a synthesis between Islam and philosophy is possible. One way to find a synthesis is to use philosophical arguments to prove that one's preset religious principles are true. This is a common technique found in the writings of many religious traditions, including Judaism, Christianity and Islam, but this is not generally accepted as true philosophy by philosophers. Another way to find a synthesis is to abstain from holding as true any religious principles of one's faith at all, unless one independently comes to those conclusions from a philosophical analysis. However, this is not generally accepted as being faithful to one's religion by adherents of that religion. A third, rarer and more difficult path is to apply analytical philosophy to one's own religion. In this case a religious person would also be a philosopher, by asking questions such as:

What is the nature of God? How do we know that God exists?
What is the nature of revelation? How do we know that God reveals his will to mankind?
Which of our religious traditions must be interpreted literally?
Which of our religious traditions must be interpreted allegorically?
What must one actually believe to be considered a true adherent of our religion?
How can one reconcile the findings of philosophy with religion?
How can one reconcile the findings of science with religion?

This is the task of Islamic philosophy.

Introduction

This idea of Islamic philosophy dates from the appearance of dissenting sects in Islam. A century had hardly elapsed after the life of Muhammad (known as the sira) when religious schisms began to arise.

At this point readers may want to review early Muslim philosophy.

Formative influences

Islamic philosophy as the name implies refers to Philsopohical activity within the Islamic Mileau. The main sources of classical or early Islamic Philosophy are the religion of Islam itself, the Greek Philosophical heritage which the early Muslims inherited as a result of conquests when Alexandria, Syria and Jundishapur came under Muslim rule. Many of the early philosophical debates centered around reconciling religion and reason. The latter being exemplified by Greek Philosophy.

The Classical Period

Independent minds exploiting the methods of ijtihad sought to investigate the doctrines of the Qur'an, which until then had been accepted in blind faith on the authority of divine revelation. The first independent protest was that of the Kadar (Arabic: kadara, to have power), whose partisans affirmed the freedom of the will, in contrast with the Jabarites (jabar, force, constraint), who maintained the belief in fatalism.

In the second century of the Hegira, a schism arose in the theological schools of Basra. A pupil, Wasil ibn Atha, who was expelled from the school because his answers were contrary to then orthodox Islamic tradition, proclaimed himself leader of a new school, and systematized the radical opinions of preceding sects, particularly those of the Kadarites. This new school or sect was called Mutazilite or Motazilite (from itazala, to separate oneself, to dissent). Its principal dogmas were three:

God is an absolute unity, and no attribute can be ascribed to Him.
Man is a free agent. It is on account of these two principles that the Motazilites designate themselves the "Partisans of Justice and Unity".
All knowledge necessary for the salvation of man emanates from his reason; humans could acquire knowledge before, as well as after, Revelation, by the sole light of reason. This fact makes knowledge obligatory upon all men, at all times, and in all places.

The Motazilites, compelled to defend their principles against the orthodox Islam of their day, looked for support in philosophy, and founded a rational theology called "'Ilm-al-Kalam" (Science of the Word); those professing it were called Motekallamin. This appellation, originally designating the Motazilites, soon became the common name for all seeking philosophical demonstration in confirmation of religious principles. The first Motekallamin had to combat both the orthodox and the infidel parties, between whom they occupied the middle ground; but the efforts of subsequent generations were entirely concentrated against the philosophers.

From the ninth century onward, owing to Calif al-Ma'mun and his successor, Greek philosophy was introduced among the Persians and Arabs, and the Peripatetic school began to find able representatives among them; such were Al-Kindi, Al-Farabi, Ibn Sina(Avicinna), and Ibn Rushd(Averroës), all of whose fundamental principles were considered as heresies by the Motekallamin.

During the Abbasid caliphate a number of thinkers and scientists, many of them non-Muslims or heretical Muslims, played a role in transmitting Greek, Hindu, and other pre-Islamic knowledge to the Christian West. They contributed to making Aristotle known in Christian Europe. Three speculative thinkers, the Persians, al-Farabi, and Avicenna, and Arab thinker, al-Kindi combined Aristotelianism and Neoplatonism with other ideas introduced through Islam. They were highly unorthodox and it is open to question whether they could be considered Islamic philosophers.

From Spain the Arabic philosophic literature was translated into Hebrew and Latin, contributing to the development of modern European philosophy. The Egyptian philosophers Moses Maimonides (who was Jewish) and Ibn Khaldun were also important.

Aristotle attempted to demonstrate the unity of God; but from the view which he maintained, that matter was eternal, it followed that God could not be the Creator of the world. To assert that God's knowledge extends only to the general laws of the universe, and not to individual and accidental things, is tantamount to denying prophecy. One other point shocked the faith of the Motekallamin — the theory of the intellect. The Peripatetics taught that the human soul was only an aptitude — a faculty capable of attaining every variety of passive perfection — and that through information and virtue it became qualified for union with the active intellect, which latter emanates from God. To admit this theory would be to deny the immortality of the soul.

Wherefore the Motekallamin had, before anything else, to establish a system of philosophy to demonstrate the creation of matter, and they adopted to that end the theory of atoms as enunciated by Democritus. They taught that atoms possess neither quantity nor extension. Originally atoms were created by God, and are created now as occasion seems to require. Bodies come into existence or die, through the aggregation or the sunderance of these atoms. But this theory did not remove the objections of philosophy to a creation of matter.

For, indeed, if it be supposed that God commenced His work at a certain definite time by His "will," and for a certain definite object, it must be admitted that He was imperfect before accomplishing His will, or before attaining His object. In order to obviate this difficulty, the Motekallamin extended their theory of the atoms to Time, and claimed that just as Space is constituted of atoms and vacuum, Time, likewise, is constituted of small indivisible moments. The creation of the world once established, it was an easy matter for them to demonstrate the existence of a Creator, and that God is unique, omnipotent, and omniscient.

The oldest religio-philosophical work preserved is that of the Jewish philosopher Saadia Gaon (892-942), Emunot ve-Deot, "The Book of Beliefs and Opinions". In this work Saadia treats the questions that interested the Motekallamim, such as the creation of matter, the unity of God, the divine attributes, the soul, etc. Saadia criticizes other philosophers severely. For Saadia there was no problem as to creation: God created the world ex nihilo, just as the Bible attests; and he contests the theory of the Motekallamin in reference to atoms, which theory, he declares, is just as contrary to reason and religion as the theory of the philosophers professing the eternity of matter.

To prove the unity of God, Saadia uses the demonstrations of the Motekallamin. Only the attributes of essence (sifat-al-datiat) can be ascribed to God, but not the attributes of action (sifat-al-af'aliyat). The soul is a substance more delicate even than that of the celestial spheres. Here Saadia controverts the Motekallamin, who considered the soul an "accident" (compare "Moreh," i. 74), and employs the following one of their premises to justify his position: "Only a substance can be the substratum of an accident" (that is, of a non-essential property of things). Saadia argues: "If the soul be an accident only, it can itself have no such accidents as wisdom, joy, love," etc. Saadia was thus in every way a supporter of the Kalam; and if at times he deviated from its doctrines, it was owing to his religious views; just as the Jewish and Moslem Peripatetics stopped short in their respective Aristotelianism whenever there was danger of wounding orthodox religion.

The twelfth century saw the apotheosis of pure philosophy and the decline of the Kalam, which latter, being attacked by both the philosophers and the orthodox, perished for lack of champions. This supreme exaltation of philosophy was due, in great measure, to Ghazali (1005-1111) among the Persians, and to Judah ha-Levi (1140) among the Jews. In fact, the attacks directed against the philosophers by Ghazali in his work, "Tuhfat al-Falasafa" (The Destruction of the Philosophers), not only produced, by reaction, a current favorable to philosophy, but induced the philosophers themselves to profit by his criticism, they thereafter making their theories clearer and their logic closer. The influence of this reaction brought forth the two greatest philosophers that the Islamic Peripatetic school ever produced, namely, Ibn Baja (Aven Pace) and Ibn Roshd (Averroes), both of whom undertook the defense of philosophy.

Since no idea and no literary or philosophical movement ever germinated on Persian or Arabian soil without leaving its impress on the Jews, the Persian Ghazali found an imitator in the person of Judah ha-Levi. This poet took upon himself to free his religion from what he saw as the shackles of speculative philosophy, and to this end wrote the "Kuzari," in which he sought to discredit all schools of philosophy alike. He passes severe censure upon the Motekallamin for seeking to support religion by philosophy. He says, "I consider him to have attained the highest degree of perfection who is convinced of religious truths without having scrutinized them and reasoned over them" ("Kuzari," v.). Then he reduced the chief propositions of the Motekallamin, to prove the unity of God, to ten in number, describing them at length, and concluding in these terms: "Does the Kalam give us more information concerning God and His attributes than the prophet did?" (Ib. iii. and iv.) Aristotelianism finds no favor in Judah ha-Levi's eyes, for it is no less given to details and criticism; Neoplatonism alone suited him somewhat, owing to its appeal to his poetic temperament.

Ibn Rushd (or Ibn Roshd or Averroës), the contemporary of Maimonides, closed the first great philosophical era of the Muslims. The boldness of this great commentator of Aristotle aroused the full fury of the orthodox, who, in their zeal, attacked all philosophers indiscriminately, and had all philosophical writings committed to the flames. The theories of Ibn Roshd do not differ fundamentally from those of Ibn Baja and Ibn Tufail, who only follow the teachings of Ibn Sina and Al-Farabi. Like all Islamic Peripatetics, Ibn Roshd admits the hypothesis of the intelligence of the spheres and the hypothesis of universal emanation, through which motion is communicated from place to place to all parts of the universe as far as the supreme world—hypotheses which, in the mind of the Arabic philosophers, did away with the dualism involved in Aristotle's doctrine of pure energy and eternal matter.

But while Al-Farabi, Ibn Sina, and other Persian and Muslim philosophers hurried, so to speak, over subjects that trenched on religious dogmas, Ibn Roshd delighted in dwelling upon them with full particularity and stress. Thus he says, "Not only is matter eternal, but form is potentially inherent in matter; otherwise, it were a creation ex nihilo (Munk, "Mélanges," p. 444). According to this theory,therefore, the existence of this world is not only a possibility, as Ibn Sina declared—in order to make concessions to the orthodox—but also a necessity.

Driven from the Islamic schools, Islamic philosophy found a refuge with the Jews, to whom belongs the honor of having transmitted it to the Christian world. A series of eminent men—such as the Ibn Tibbons, Narboni, Gersonides—joined in translating the Arabic philosophical works into Hebrew and commenting upon them. The works of Ibn Roshd especially became the subject of their study, due in great measure to Maimonides, who, in a letter addressed to his pupil Joseph ibn Aknin, spoke in the highest terms of Ibn Roshd's commentary.

Later Muslim Philosophy

The death of Ibn Rushd effectively marks the end of the classical or early era of Islamic philosophy. Philosophical activity declined significantly in the Islamic lands in the West namely in Spain and North Africa though it held for much longer in the Eatsern lands like Iran. The most notable luminary of the later period is Ibn Khaldun who put forward one of the first systematic philosophies of history. Mulla Sadra (1571-1637) also known as Sadr al-Din Shirazi was the most significant in terms of influence on Islamic Philosophy in Persia in the later period. Mulla Sadr synthesized the Philosophies of Ibn Sina, Sehrawardi and Ibn Arabi. The Iraninan Philosopher Hadi Ibn Mahdi Sabzawari was also deeply influenced by Mulla Sadra.

Modern Muslim philosophy

Modern Islamic philosophy seeks in some respects to renew the dialogue between Mutazilite and Asharite views about ethics in knowledge. An example is the Islamization of knowledge, and the view of khalifa of Seyyed Hossein Nasr. There is a separate article on these new trends.

Sociology of knowledge

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The sociology of knowledge is the study of the social origins of ideas, and of the effects prevailing ideas have on societies. (Compare history of ideas.)

The term first came into widespread use in the 1920s, when a number of German-speaking sociologists wrote extensively on it, notably Max Scheler, and Karl Mannheim with Ideology and Utopia. With the dominance of functionalism through the middle years of the 20th century, the sociology of knowledge tended to remain on the periphery of mainstream sociological thought. It was largely reinvented and applied much more closely to everyday life in the 1960s, particularly by Peter L. Berger and Thomas Luckmann in The social construction of reality (1966) and is still central for methods dealing with qualitative understanding of human society. Compare socially constructed reality.

Although very influential within modern sociology, the sociology of knowledge can claim its most significant impact on science more generally through its contribution to debate and understanding of the nature of science itself, most notably through the work of Thomas Kuhn on The structure of scientific revolutions (see also: paradigm).

Schools

Karl Mannheim

The German political philosophers Karl Marx (1818–1883) and Friedrich Engels (1820–1895) argued in Die Deutsche Ideologie (1846, German Ideology) and elsewhere that people's ideologies, including their social and political beliefs and opinions, are rooted in their class interests, and more generally in the social and economic circumstances in which they live: "It is men, who in developing their material inter-course, change, along with this their real existence, their thinking and the products of their thinking. Life is not determined by consciousness, but consciousness by life" (Marx-Engels Gesamtausgabe 1/5).

Under the influence of this doctrine, and of Phenomenology, the Hungarian-born German sociologist Karl Mannheim (1893–1947) gave impetus to the growth of the sociology of knowledge with his Ideologie und Utopie (1929, translated and extended in 1936 as Ideology and Utopia), although the term had been introduced five years earlier by the co-founder of the movement, the German philosopher and social theorist Max Scheler (1874–1928), in Versuche zu einer Soziologie des Wissens (1924, Attempts at a Sociology of Knowledge). A strong interpretation claims that all knowledge and beliefs are the products of socio-political forces, but this version is self-defeating, because if it is true, then it too is merely a product of socio-political forces and has no claim to truth and no persuasive force. Mannheim sought to escape this paradox by exempting free-floating intellectuals, whom he claimed were only loosely anchored in social traditions, relatively detached from the class system, and capable of avoiding the pitfalls of total ideologies and of forging a "dynamic synthesis" of the ideologies of other groups.

Phenomenological sociology

to be written

Michel Foucault

A particularly important strain of the sociology of knowledge is the criticism by Michel Foucault. In Madness and Civilization: A History of Insanity in the Age of Reason, 1961, he argued that conceptions of madness and what was considered "reason" or "knowledge" was itself subject to major culture bias - in this respect mirroring similar criticisms by Thomas Szasz, at the time the foremost critic of psychiatry, and himself now an eminent psychiatrist. A point where Foucault and Szasz agreed was that sociological processes played the major role in defining "madness" as an "illness" and prescribing "cures".

In The Birth of the Clinic: An Archaeology of Medical Perception, 1963, Foucault extended his critique to all of modern scientific medicine, arguing for the central conceptual metaphor of "The Gaze", which had implications for medical education, prison design, and the carceral state as understood today. Concepts of criminal justice and its intersection with medicine were better developed in this work than in Szasz and others, who confined their critique to current psychiatric practice.

Finally, in The Order of Things: An Archaeology of the Human Sciences, 1966, and The Archaeology of Knowledge, 1969, Foucault introduced the abstract notions of mathesis and taxonomia. These, he claimed, had transformed 17th and 18th century studies of "general grammar" into modern "linguistics", "natural history" into modern "biology", and "analysis of wealth" into modern "economics". Not, claimed Foucault, without loss of meaning. The 19th century had transformed what knowledge was.

Perhaps Foucault's best-known and most controversial claim was that before the 18th century, "Man did not exist". The notions of humanity and of humanism were inventions or creations of this 19th century transformation. Accordingly, a cognitive bias had been introduced unwittingly into science, by over-trusting the individual doctor or scientist's ability to see and state things objectively. This study still guides the sociology of knowledge and has been claimed to have sparked single-handedly much of postmodernism.

Bruno Latour

Bruno Latour is a French sociologist of science best known for his books We Have Never Been Modern, Laboratory Life, and Science in Action, describing the process of scientific research from the perspective of social construction based on field observations of working scientists.

The sociology of mathematical knowledge

Studies of mathematical practice and quasi-empiricism in mathematics are also rightly part of the sociology of knowledge, since they focus on the community of those who practice mathematics and their common assumptions. Since Eugene Wigner raised the issue in 1960 and Hilary Putnam made it more rigorous in 1975, the question of why fields such as physics and mathematics should agree so well has been in question. Proposed solutions point out that the fundamental constituents of mathematical thought, space, form-structure, and number-proportion are also the fundamental constituents of physics. It is also worthwhile to note that physics is nothing but a modeling of reality, and seeing causal relationships governing repeatable observed phenomena, and much of mathematics has been developed precisely for the goal of developing these models in a rigorous fashion. Another approach is to suggest that there is no deep problem, that the division of human scientific thinking through using words such as 'mathematics' and 'physics' is only useful in their practical everyday function to categorify and distinguish.

Fundamental contributions to the sociology of mathematical knowledge have been made by Sal Restivo and David Bloor. Restivo draws upon the work of scholars such as Oswald Spengler (The Decline of the West, 1926), Raymond L. Wilder and Lesley A. White, as well as contemporary sociologists of knowledge and science studies scholars. David Bloor draws upon Ludwig Wittgenstein and other contemporary thinkers. They both claim that mathematical knowledge is socially constructed and has irreducible contingent and historical factors woven into it. More recently Paul Ernest has proposed a social constructivist account of mathematical knowledge, drawing on the works of both of these sociologists.

An interesting artifact in the sociology of knowledge is the Erdős number (the length of the smallest path in the network of all mathematicians to Paul Erdős).

What is Nihilism?

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ni·hil·ism (nī'ə-lĭz'əm, nē'-)
n.

Philosophy.

An extreme form of skepticism that denies all existence.
A doctrine holding that all values are baseless and that nothing can be known or communicated.

Rejection of all distinctions in moral or religious value and a willingness to repudiate all previous theories of morality or religious belief.
The belief that destruction of existing political or social institutions is necessary for future improvement.
also Nihilism A diffuse, revolutionary movement of mid 19th-century Russia that scorned authority and tradition and believed in reason, materialism, and radical change in society and government through terrorism and assassination.
Psychiatry. A delusion, experienced in some mental disorders, that the world or one's mind, body, or self does not exist.

[Latin nihil, nothing + –ISM.]

ni'hil·ist n.
ni'hil·is'tic adj.
ni'hil·is'ti·cal·ly adv.

This article is about the philosophical position. For the Russian political and revolutionary movement, see Nihilist movement.

Nihilism literally means belief in nothing. As a philosophical position, nihilism is the view that the world, and especially human existence, is without meaning, purpose, comprehensible truth, or essential value. It is more often a charge levelled against a particular idea than a position to which someone is overtly subscribed. Movements such as Dada, Deconstructionism, and Punk have been described by various observers as "nihilist". Nihilism is also a characteristic that has been ascribed to time periods: for example, Baudrillard has called postmodernity a nihilistic epoch, and some Christian theologians and figures of authority assert that modernity and postmodernity represent the rejection of God, and therefore are nihilist.

Prominent philosophers that have written on nihilism include Friedrich Nietzsche and Martin Heidegger. Nietzsche described Christianity as a nihilistic religion, because it removed meaning from this earthly life, and focused instead on a supposed afterlife. He also saw nihilism as a natural result of the realization that "God is Dead", and insisted that it was something to be overcome, by returning meaning to the earth. The latter described it as the state where "there is nothing left of Being as such", and argued that nihilism rested on the reduction of being to mere value.

Etymological origins

The term comes from Latin nihil, meaning "not anything", through the Russian "nigilizm". The Oxford English Dictionary gives 1817 as its earliest use in English, and Alain Rey's Dictionnaire historique de la langue française (rev. ed. 1995) gives 1787 as the first use of the word in French, noting that nihiliste was used in 1761, though in a religious sense of 'heretic' that is now obsolete. The Russian nigilizm to which the term owes much of its modern impetus first appears in 1829, according to Rey.

The Latin indefinite pronoun nihil ('nothing') is a reduced form of nihilum, a term that derives from ne-hilom an emphatic form of the negation ne by means of hilum, meaning 'the slightest amount' and of uncertain origin.

Nihilism in philosophy

Though the term nihilism was first popularized by Ivan Turgenev (see below), it was first introduced into philosophical discourse by Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi (1743-1819), who used the term to characterize rationalism, and in particular Immanuel Kant's "critical" philosophy in order to carry out a reductio ad absurdum according to which all rationalism (philosophy as criticism) reduces to nihilism, and thus it should be avoided and replaced with a return to some type of faith and revelation.

Friedrich Nietzsche's later work was obsessed with nihilism. Book One of The Will to Power, which consists of an arrangement of selections from Nietzsche's notebooks from 1883 to 1888, is entitled "European Nihilism," which he calls "the problem of the nineteenth century." Nietzsche characterized nihilism as emptying the world and especially human existence of meaning, purpose, comprehensible truth, or essential value.

Though derided by some as nihilistic, postmodernism can be contrasted with the above formulation of nihilism in that nihilism tends toward defeatism, while postmodern philosophers tend to find strength and reason for celebration in the varied and unique human relationships it explores. Nihilism can also readily be compared to skepticism as both reject claims to knowledge and truth, though skepticism does not necessarily come to any conclusions about the reality of moral concepts nor does it deal so intimately with questions about the meaning of an existence without knowable truth.

Nihilism in ethics and morality

In the world of ethics, nihilist or nihilistic is often used as a derogatory word referring to a complete rejection of all systems of authority, morality, and social custom, or one who purportedly makes such a rejection. Either through the rejection of previously accepted bases of belief or through extreme relativism or skepticism, the nihilist is construed as one who believes that none of these claims to power are valid, and often that they should be fought against. From a nihilist point of view, the ultimate source of moral values is the individual rather than culture or another rational foundation.

Postmodernism and the breakdown of knowledge

Postmodern thought is colored by the perception of a degeneration of systems of epistemology and ethics into extreme relativism, especially evident in the writings of Jean-François Lyotard and Jacques Derrida. These philosophers tend to deny the very grounds on which we base our truths: absolute knowledge and meaning, the accumulation of positive knowledge, historical progress, and the ideals of humanism and the Enlightenment. Though it is often described as a fundamentally nihilist philosophy, before entering a brief discussion on postmodern thought it is important to note that nihilism itself is open to postmodern criticism: nihilism is a claim to a universal truth, exactly what postmodernism rejects.

Lyotard and meta-narratives

Lyotard argues that, rather than relying on an objective truth or method to prove their claims (logic, empiricism, etc.), philosophers legitimize their truths by reference to a story about the world which is inseparable from the age and system the stories belong to. Lyotard calls them meta-narratives. He then goes on to define the postmodern condition as one characterized by a rejection both of these meta-narratives and of the process of legitimization by meta-narratives.

In lieu of meta-narratives we have created new language-games in order to legitimize our claims which rely on changing relationships and mutable truths, none of which is privileged over the other to speak to ultimate truth. It is this unstable concept of truth and meaning that leads one close to nihilism, though in the same move that plunges toward meaninglessness, Lyotard suspends his philosophy just above its surface.

Nihilism and Nietzsche

"To the clean are all things clean" — thus say the people. I, however, say unto you: To the swine all things become swinish!

Therefore preach the visionaries and bowed-heads (whose hearts are also bowed down): "The world itself is a filthy monster."

For these are all unclean spirits; especially those, however, who have no peace or rest, unless they see the world FROM THE BACKSIDE — the backworldsmen!

TO THOSE do I say it to the face, although it sound unpleasantly: the world resembleth man, in that it hath a backside, — SO MUCH is true!

There is in the world much filth: SO MUCH is true! But the world itself is not therefore a filthy monster!

-Thus Spoke Zarathustra, Project Gutenberg eText

While few philosophers would claim to be nihilists, nihilism is most often associated with Friedrich Nietzsche. Nietzsche defined the term as any philosophy that, rejecting the real world around us and physical existence along with it, results in an apathy toward life and a poisoning of the human soul — and opposed it vehemently. He describes it as "the will to nothingness" — in this sense the philosophical equivalent to the Russian political movement mentioned above: the irrational leap beyond skepticism — the desire to destroy meaning, knowledge, and value. To him, it was irrational because the human soul thrives on value. Nihilism, then, was in a sense like suicide and mass murder all at once. He saw this philosophy as present in Christianity and Christian morality, which he describes as slave morality, and in asceticism and any excessively skeptical philosophy.

Nietzsche is referred to as a nihilist in part because he famously announced "God is dead!" What he meant by this oft-repeated statement was not that God has passed away in a literal sense, or even necessarily that God doesn't exist, but that we don't believe in God anymore, that even those of us who profess faith in God really don't believe. God is dead, then, in the sense that his existence is now irrelevant to the bulk of humanity. "And we," he says in The Gay Science, "have killed him." Nietzsche also recognized that, even though he viewed Christian morality as nihilistic, without God humanity is left with no epistemological or moral base from which we can derive absolute beliefs. Thus, even though nihilism has been a threat in the past, through Christianity, Platonism, and various political movements that aim toward a distant utopian future, and any other philosophy that devalues human life and the world around us (and any philosophy that devalues the world around us by privileging some other or future world necessarily devalues human life), Nietzsche tells us it is also a threat for humanity's future - this warning can also be taken as a polemic against 19th and 20th century scientism.

Nietzsche advocated a remedy for nihilism's destructive effects and a hope for humanity's future in the form of the Übermensch, a position especially apparent in his works Also Sprach Zarathustra and The Antichrist. The ubermensch is an exercise of action and life: one must give value to their existence by behaving as if one's very existence were a work of art. Nietzsche believed that the ubermensch "exercise" would be a necessity for human survival in the post-religious era.

Another part of Nietzsche's remedy for nihilism is a revaluation of morals — he hoped that we are able to discard the old morality of equality and servitude and adopt a new code, turning Judeo-Christian morality on its head. Excess, carelessness, callousness, and sin, then, are not the damning acts of a person with no regard for his salvation, nor that which plummets a society toward decadence and decline, but the signifier of a soul already withering and the sign that a society is in decline. The only true sin to Nietzsche is that which is against a human nature aimed at the expression and venting of one's power. Virtue, likewise, is not to act according to what has been commanded, but to contribute to all that betters a human soul.

Nietzsche attempts to reintroduce what he calls a master morality, which values personal excellence over forced compassion and creative acts of will over the herd instinct, a moral outlook he attributes to the ancient Greeks. The Christian moral ideals developed in opposition to this master morality, he says, as the reversal of the value system of the elite social class due to the oppressed class' resentment of their Roman masters. Nietzsche, however, did not believe that humans should adopt master morality as the be-all-end-all code of behavior - he believed that the revaluation of morals would correct the inconsistencies in both master and slave morality - but simply that master morality was preferable to slave morality.

The nihilist paradox

Nihilism is often described as a belief in the nonexistence of truth. In its most extreme form, such a belief is difficult to justify, because it contains a variation on the liar paradox: if it is true that truth does not exist, the statement "truth does not exist" is in itself not a truth, thereby proving itself incorrect. A more sophisticated interpretation of the claim might be that while truth may exist, it is inaccessible in practice, but this leaves open the problem of how the skeptic or nihilist has accessed it.

Some would proffer that the nihilist has not accessed truth directly, but has come to the conclusion that truth is ultimately unattainable within the confines of human circumstance. Thus, since the nihilist knows truth cannot be attained in this life, he/she looks upon the activities of those rigorously seeking truth as futile.

Nihilism in art

There have been various movements in art, such as surrealism and cubism, which have been criticized for touching on nihilism, and others like Dada which have embraced it openly. More generally, modern art has been criticised as nihilistic due to its often non-representative nature, as happened with the Nazi party's Degenerate art exhibit.

Nihilistic themes can be found in literature and music as well. This is especially true of contemporary music and literature, where the uncertainty following what some perceive as the demise of modernism is explored in detail.

Dada

The term Dada was first used during World War I, an event that precipitated the movement, which lasted from approximately 1916 to 1923. The Dadaists claimed that Dada was not an art movement, but an anti-art movement, sometimes using found objects in a manner similar to found poetry and labeling them art, thus undermining ideas of what art is and what it can be. At other times Dadaists paid attention to aesthetic guidelines only so they could be avoided, attempting to render their works devoid of meaning and aesthetic value. This tendency toward devaluation of art has led many to claim that Dada was essentially a nihilist movement a destruction without creation.

Nihilism in literature

Although the word nihilism is of recent historical vintage, the attitude it represents is not, as is seen in a famous passage near the end of Shakespeare's Macbeth — though Macbeth is not speaking of universal collapse or expansion but the brute and more immediate fact of human death:

Out, out, brief candle!

Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player

That struts and frets his hour upon the stage

And then is heard no more; it is a tale

Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,

Signifying nothing. (Act 5, Scene 5)

In nineteenth-century culture, nihilism was given wide currency by the Russian novelist Ivan Turgenev in his novel Fathers and Sons (1862) to describe the views of an emerging radical Russian intelligentsia. These consisted primarily of upper-class students who had grown disillusioned with the slow pace of reformism. The primary spokesman for this new philosophy was D. I. Pisarev (1840-1868) who articulated a program of Revolutionary Utilitarianism and advocated violence as a tool for social change. Pisarev was cast as Bazarov in Fathers and Sons much to his own delight; he proudly embraced his new status as a fictional hero and villain.

After its popularization in the character of Bazarov, the word quickly became a catch-all term of derision for younger, more radical generations, and continues in this vein to modern times. It is often used to indicate a group or philosophy the speaker intends to characterize as having no moral sensibility, no belief in truth, beauty, love, or whatever else the speaker and his presumed audience values, and no regard for the current social conventions.

In Germinal (1885), by Emile Zola, the nihilist character Souvarine dramatizes the danger of nihilism when, in a climactic scene, he sabotages a coal mine and causes a catastrophic accident, then slips away. Souvarine's lack of belief, frequently expressed, is a foil to the optimistic socialism that fuels the coal miners' revolt.

The work of Albert Camus can be read as a sustained engagement with nihilism.

In contemporary literature, themes of nihilism can also be found in Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand and many of Kurt Vonnegut's books. Robert Stone, additionally, is a contemporary American novelist who has often thematized nihilism in his work. In A Flag for Sunrise (1981), for example, the anthropologist Holliwell is a protagonist struggling against his own nihilistic tendencies. Another American author who is commonly believed to deal with themes of nihilism is Chuck Palahniuk. In his 1996 novel Fight Club, for example, the ultimate goal of the book's 'project mayhem' is the destruction of modern civilization in order to rebuild humanity. Palahniuk, however, claims that he does not purposely focus on the subject.

Nihilism in Music

Punk rock has often been regarded as taking a nihilistic and anarchistic view of the world around it. Another approach to nihilism has been taken by Death Metal, whose intentionally bizarre song structures and morbid lyrics depict life's meaninglessness and a lack of absolute morals.

However, the subcultures that have sprung up around these genres contain some amount of unique social norms and mores. An example would be so-called "Pit Etiquette". These are the rules of common courtesy that dictate behavior in mosh pits at concerts. The existence of these mores suggests that although lyrically and artistically a philosophy of Nihilism may permeate these genres, the draw to their normally younger fan base may be more based on an illusion of rebellion than any real nihilistic beliefs.

External links

Catholic Encyclopedia: Nihilism (http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/11074a.htm)
Center for Nihilist and Nihilism Studies (http://www.nihil.org)
Fathers and Sons by Ivan Turgenev, the first novel about Nihilism. (http://www.ibiblio.org/eldritch/ist/fas.htm)
Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy: Nihilism (http://www.utm.edu/research/iep/n/nihilism.htm)
Modernity and Nihilism - A religious ethicist's argument that secular history and modernity represent Nihilism (http://www.pmanzoor.info/MWBR-Modernity-Nihilism.htm)
Nihilism and the Postmodern in Vattimo's Nietzsche, Ashley Woodward (http://www.ul.ie/~philos/vol6/nihilism.html)
Nihilism: The Root of the Revolution of the Modern Age by Fr. Seraphim (Eugene) Rose (http://www.columbia.edu/cu/augustine/arch/nihilism.html)
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy: Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi (http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/friedrich-jacobi/)
"Elisha Shapiro's ongoing conceptual art exploration of Nihilism" (http://www.nihilists.net/)

References

Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi [1] (http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/friedrich-jacobi/). entry by George di Giovanni on the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy website
Nietzsche, Friedrich (1886). Beyond Good and Evil (ftp://ibiblio.org/pub/docs/books/gutenberg/etext03/bygdv10.txt). Project Gutenberg eText.
Nietzsche, Friedrich. Thus Spake Zarathustra (http://www.ibiblio.org/gutenberg/etext99/spzar10.txt). Project Gutenberg eText.

Books on Nihilism

Nihilism, The Root of the Revolution of the Modern Age, Eugene (Fr. Seraphim) Rose, Fr. Seraphim Rose Foundation, Forestville, CA, l994,l995.

Shows About Nothing: Nihilism in Popular Culture from The Exorcist to Seinfeld, Thomas S. Hibbs, Spence Publishing Company, Dallas, TX, 2000.

What is Materialism?

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ma·te·ri·al·ism (mə-tîr'ē-ə-lĭz'əm)
n.

Philosophy. The theory that physical matter is the only reality and that everything, including thought, feeling, mind, and will, can be explained in terms of matter and physical phenomena.
The theory or attitude that physical well-being and worldly possessions constitute the greatest good and highest value in life.
A great or excessive regard for worldly concerns.

This article primarily focuses on the general concepts of matter and existence. For usage related to the prioritization of spending resources, see economic materialism.

Materialism is the philosophical view that the only thing that can truly be said to 'exist' is matter; that fundamentally, all things are comprised of 'material'. The view is perhaps best understood in its opposition to the doctrines of immaterial substance applied to the mind historically, and most famously by René Descartes. However, by itself materialism says nothing about how material substance should be characterized. In practice it is frequently assimilated to one variety of physicalism or another.

Materialism is sometimes allied with the methodological principle of reductionism, according to which the objects or phenomena individuated at one level of description, if they are genuine, must be explicable in terms of the objects or phenomena at some other level of description -- typically, a more general level than the reduced one. Non-reductive materialism explicitly rejects this notion, however, taking the material constitution of all particulars to be consistent with the existence of real objects, properties, or phenomena not explicable in the terms canonically used for the basic material constituents. Jerry Fodor influentially argues this view, according to which empirical laws and explanations in "special sciences" like psychology or geology are invisible from the perspective of, say, basic physics. A vigorous literature has grown up around the relation between these views.

"Materialism" has also frequently been understood to designate an entire scientific, "rationalistic" world view, particularly by religious thinkers opposed to it and also by Marxists. It typically contrasts with dualism, phenomenalism, idealism, and vitalism.

For Marxism, materialism is central to the "materialist conception of history", which centers on the empirical world of actual human activity (practice, including labor) and institutions created, reproduced, or destroyed by that activity.

The definition of "matter" in modern philosophical materialism extends to all scientifically observable entities such as energy, forces, and the curvature of space. In this view, one might speak of the "material world".

Varieties of materialism

History of materialism

Ancient Greek philosophers like Parmenides, Epicurus, and even Aristotle prefigure later materialists. Later on, Thomas Hobbes and Pierre Gassendi represent the materialist tradition, in opposition to René Descartes' attempts to provide the natural sciences with dualist foundations. Later materialists included Denis Diderot and other French enlightenment thinkers, as well as Ludwig Feuerbach.

Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, turning the idealist dialectics of Georg Hegel "upside down", provided materialism with a view on processes of quantitative and qualitative change called dialectical materialism, and with a materialist account of the course of history, known as historical materialism.

In recent years, Paul and Patricia Churchland have advocated an extreme form of materialism, eliminativist materialism, which holds that mental phenomena simply do not exist at all -- that talk of the mental reflects a totally spurious "folk psychology" that simply has no basis in fact, something like the way that folk science speaks of demon-caused illness.

References

Churchland, Paul (1981). Eliminative Materialism and the Propositional Attitudes. The Philosophy of Science. Boyd, Richard; P. Gasper; J. D. Trout. Cambridge, Massachusetts, MIT Press.
Flanagan, Owen (1991). The Science of the Mind. 2nd edition Cambridge Massachusetts, MIT Press.
Fodor, J.A. (1974) Special Sciences, Synthese, Vol.28.
Kim, J. (1994) Multiple Realization and the Metaphysics of Reduction, Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, Vol. 52.
Moser, P. K.; J. D. Trout, Ed. (1995) Contemporary Materialism: A Reader. New York, Routledge.
Vitzthum, Richard C. (1995) Materialism: An Affirmative History and Definition. Amhert, New York, Prometheus Books.
Buchner, L. (1920). Force and Matter. New York, Peter Eckler Publishing CO.
Maetmere, Man The machine

What is Social Justice?

2005-10-17T21:11:00.000-07:00

Social Justice is a concept that has fascinated philosophers ever since Plato rebuked the young Sophist, Thrasymachus, for asserting that justice was whatever the strongest decided it would be. In The Republic, Plato formalised the argument that an ideal state would rest on four virtues: wisdom, courage, moderation, and justice.

The addition of the word social is to clearly distinguish Social Justice from the concept of justice as applied in the law — state-administered systems which label behaviour as unacceptable and enforce a formal mechanism of control may produce results that do not match the philosophical definitions of social justice — and from more informal concepts of justice embedded in systems of morality and which differ from culture to culture and therefore lack universality. Social justice is also used to refer to the overall fairness of a society in its divisions and distributions of rewards and burdens and, as such, the phrase has been adopted by political parties with a redistributive agenda.

The conceptual problem

Social Justice derives its authority from the codes of morality prevailing in each culture. In an ideal world, human behaviour could be improved by convincing everyone to adopt the principles of moral philosophy. But the human propensity to evaluate shades of gray becomes the catalyst for a problem that can be stated simply: If a moral code may sometimes require a person to do something that would not be for his or her own benefit, why should that person decide to be "moral" and so act in a correspondingly "just" way?

The evolving answer

Humans are vulnerable as individuals. By gathering together into bands and communities, they seek to gain strength and to address their vulnerabilities which, in turn, creates the potential to develop into more complex and evolving civilisations. If simple survival is to be transformed into long-term security, something more than co-ordinating the contribution of everyone's skills will be required. A social organisation will be needed to resolve disputes and offer physical security against attack. The achievement of community aims will depend upon the co-ordination of many functional specialisations (such as farmers for food, soldiers for protection and rulers for resource management) and a willingness of community members to sacrifice some personal freedom for the greater good.

So, would defining or administering justice become one of these specialisations and, as such, be the exclusive responsibility of any one class of citizens? People will not accept the surrender of any of their freedoms unless they perceive real benefits flowing from their decisions. The key factor is likely to be the emergence of a consensus that the society is working in a fair way, i.e. both that individuals are allowed as much freedom as possible given the role they have within the society and that the rewards compensate adequately for any loss of freedom. Hence, true social justice is attained only through the harmonious co-operative effort of the citizens who, in their own self-interest, accept the current norms of morality as the price of membership in the community.

The next major impetus for the development of the concept came from Christianity. Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274) says, "Justice is a certain rectitude of mind whereby a man does what he ought to do in the circumstances confronting him." As a theologian, Aquinas believed that justice is a form of natural duty owed by one person to another and not enforced by any human-made law. This reflects the Christian view that, before God, all people are equal and must treat each other with respect. Hence, the framework of the argument shifts to require obedience to natural principles of morality to satisfy a duty owed to God, and the outcome of social justice is driven by the tenets of morality embedded in the religion.

A different set of moral tenets, however, produces a different outcome, as in the karmic (Buddhist) principle of justice. In Buddhism, there is no such thing as unexplained, causeless suffering. Every state of existence, good or bad, is caused by ethically good or evil deeds, and karmic justice ultimately rewards good behaviour by allowing escape from suffering into Nirvana. But each individual is judged independently of any other, and actions, good or bad, just or unjust, will have their inescapable consequence. Consequently, there is no incentive for individuals to engage in collective action to intervene in "unjust" situations. If others are suffering, those responsible for inflicting such injustice will incur bad karma and will be penalised. Further, if anyone misinterprets a situation and, by objective criteria, intervenes to force change on an innocent person, it is the one intervening who will incur bad karma no matter how well-intentioned he or she might be.

John Locke (1632-1704), an early theological utilitarian, argued that people have innate natural goodness and beauty, and so, in the long run, if individuals rationally pursue their private happiness and pleasure, the interests of the society or the general welfare will be looked after fairly. Locke characterised most of Christianity as utilitarian since believers see utility in rewards in the afterlife for their actions on Earth. The Utilitarian School was later associated with Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832) and John Stuart Mill (1806-1873) who judged the morality of an act solely on the basis of its results. In that era of the Enlightenment, naturalism and any reliance on divine inspiration was rejected. The philosophers believed that through reason and rationality, human nature and society could be perfected. Hence, justice was achieved in any situation where the greatest happiness was achieved by the greatest number of people. Bentham advocated socially-imposed external sanctions of punishment and blame to make the consequences of improper action more obviously painful. Social Justice was achieved through deterrence which is based on the rational calculation of “equal punishment for equal crime". Mill took the view that human beings are also motivated by such internal sanctions as self-esteem, guilt, and conscience. Because we all have social feelings on behalf of others, the unselfish wish for the good of all is often enough to move us to act morally.

Immanuel Kant (1724-1804) believed that actions are morally right if they are motivated by duty without regard to any personal goal, desire, motive, or self-interest. Kant's moral theory is, therefore, deontological and based on the concept of abject selflessness. In his view, the only relevant feature of moral law is its universalisability, and any rational being understands the categorical imperative to be: "Act only according to that maxim whereby you can at the same time will that it should become a universal law." For example, the imperative in the proposition that all borrowers should deal honestly with the lenders is that, in the absence of universal acceptance, no-one would be willing to lend. This may be stated as the formula of autonomy, whereby the decision to apply a maxim is actually regarded as having made it a universal law. Here the concern with human dignity is combined with the principle of universalisability to produce a conception of the moral law as self-legislated by each for all.

The modern concept

In the latter part of the twentieth century, the concept of Social Justice has largely been associated with the political philosopher John Rawls (1921-2002) who draws on the utilitarian insights of Bentham and Mill, the social contract ideas of Locke, and the categorical imperative ideas of Kant. His first statement of principle was made in A Theory of Justice (1971) where he proposed that, "Each person possesses an inviolability founded on justice that even the welfare of society as a whole cannot override. For this reason justice denies that the loss of freedom for some is made right by a greater good shared by others." (at p3). A deontological proposition that echoes Kant in framing the moral good of justice in absolutist terms. His views are definitively restated in Political Liberalism (1993), where society is seen, "as a fair system of co-operation over time, from one generation to the next." (at p14).

All societies have a basic structure of social, economic, and political institutions, both formal and informal. In testing how well these elements fit and work together, Rawls based a key test of legitimacy on the theories of social contract. To determine whether any particular system of collectively enforced social arrangements is legitimate, he argued that one must look for agreement by the people who are subject to it. Obviously, not every citizen can be asked to participate in a poll to determine his or her consent to every proposal in which some degree of coercion is involved, so we have to assume that all citizens are reasonable. Rawls constructed an argument for a two-stage process to determine a citizen's hypothetical agreement:

the citizen agrees to be represented by X for certain purposes; to that extent, X holds these powers as a trustee for the citizen;
X agrees that a use of enforcement in a particular social context is legitimate; the citizen, therefore, is bound by this decision because it is the function of the trustee to represent the citizen in this way.

This applies to one person representing a small group (e.g. to the organiser of a social event setting a dress code) as equally as it does to national governments which are the ultimate trustees, holding representative powers for the benefit of all citizens within their territorial boundaries, and if those governments fail to provide for the welfare of their citizens according to the principles of justice, they are not legitimate. To emphasise the general principle that justice should rise from the people and not be dictated by the law-making powers of governments, Rawls asserted that, "There is . . . a general presumption against imposing legal and other restrictions on conduct without sufficient reason. But this presumption creates no special priority for any particular liberty." (at pp291-292) This is support for an unranked set of liberties that reasonable citizens in all states should respect and uphold — to some extent, the list proposed by Rawls matches the normative human rights that have international recognition and direct enforcement in some nation states where the citizens need encouragement to act in a more objectively just way.

Social Justice as conceived by Rawls is an apolitical philosophical concept (insofar as any philosophical analysis of politics can be free from bias), but many of the ideas, sometimes renamed civil justice, have been adopted by those who lie on the left or center-left of the political spectrum (e.g. Socialists, Social Democrats, etc.), even though there should be general acceptance by all who base their political philosophy on moral values (e.g. in the U.S., Republican voters in the Presidential Election 2004 are said to have exercised preference on moral values). Similarly, Social Justice is fundamental to Catholic social teaching, and is one of the Four Pillars of the Green Party upheld by the worldwide green parties. As stated by several local branches, this is the principle that all persons are entitled to "basic human needs", regardless of "superficial differences such as economic disparity, class, gender, race, ethnicity, citizenship, religion, age, sexual orientation, disability, or health". This includes the eradication of poverty and illiteracy, the establishment of sound environmental policy, and equality of opportunity for healthy personal and social development.

The basic liberties

Rawls listed:

freedom of thought;
liberty of conscience as it affects social relationships on the grounds of religion, philosophy, and morality;
political liberties (e.g. representative democratic institutions, freedom of speech and the press, and freedom of assembly;
freedom of association;
freedoms necessary for the liberty and integrity of the person (viz: freedom from slavery, freedom of movement and a reasonable degree of freedom to choose one's occupation); and
rights and liberties covered by the rule of law.

Observations

The concept of Social justice has been politicised and it is sometimes stated proactively as being the promotion of equality through comprehensive government action. In practice, such interventions have not often produced equitable results, resulting in favouritism towards classes of people, restrictions of personal liberty and excessive regulatory burdens. Many critics regard the guarantee of equal outcomes, which is implicit in many social justice movements, as antithetical to the notion of equal opportunity because it frequently requires special, favoured treatment to arbitrary classes of people. Actual justice, they argue, does not penalize success nor reward failure, but holds all persons to the same standards regardless of their race, ethnic origin, financial condition, religion or beliefs.

Still others, more grassroots in orientation, regard social justice "activities" as a moral/ethical balance to less-than-effective government sponsored "legal justice". Many simply believe that a "Social Justice Action" must be initiated by the human individual on his or her own accord to be pure in its "Social Justice" intent. A case in point is a recent (2005) internet blog, http://www.thewarningsigns.blogspot.com, which was created by a Creole single mother/parent of an Arkansas middle school student, her only daughter. In it she addresses what she perceives are violations of basic accepted social/moral beliefs, and documents her decision to implement her own perspective of "Social Justice" as it pertained to how the school district dealt with school violence and bullying that was, as she put it, "terrorizing" her child by means of physical injury and murderous threats.

Beliefs

Some people concerned with social justice may hold some or all of the following beliefs:

Historical inequities insofar as they affect current injustices should be corrected until the actual inequities no longer exist or have been perceptively "negated".
The redistribution of wealth, power and status for the individual, community and societal good.
It is government's (or those who hold significant power) responsibility to ensure a basic quality of life for all its citizens.
A Direct Social Justice Action must be initiated by the individual to be "pure" or remain "virtuous" within its perceived "Social Justice" context, even though other individuals may consciously choose to participate in response (intellectually, emotionally or otherwise) to the initiator's Direct Social Justice Action.
Vigorous and uncompromising critics of any form or application of "Social Justice" whatsoever, usually have deeper motives for their convictions. For instance, furthering controversial causes like the theories purported in Eugenics. Eugenicists commonly agree that anything "social" or otherwise that could ultimately prove to assist individuals that are perceived by them to be "dysgenic", should be vehemently opposed, dismantled or at the very least contained.

Criticism

People who are critics of this notion may hold some or all of the following beliefs:

Any interpretation of social justice actions by a free thinking individual is an attempt to improperly curry favouritism from the ruling society of the day.
Favouritism as a policy is inherently unjust.
Those who are sucessful within the ruling society should not be penalized by being compelled to support those who are not.
Personal liberty is more important than government's social policies (a belief also shared by many supporter's of the Social Justice concept).
Social Justice is just a cover for social engineering, which is expensive and always fails.
What Justice is not a social action?

Other uses

Social Justice was also the name of a periodical published by Father Coughlin in the 1930s and early 1940s. Coughlin's organization was known as the National Union for Social Justice and he frequently used the term social justice in his radio broadcasts. In 1935 Coughlin made a series of broadcasts in which he outlined what he termed "the Christian principles of social justice" as an alternative to both capitalism and communism. Coughlin's views, which centered around monetary reform, have had no notable influence on those using the phrase "social justice" today, many of whom consider Coughlin's views to have been anti-Semitic.

Sources

Rawls, John. A Theory of Justice, Cambridge, Massachusetts: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1971.

Rawls, John. Political Liberalism, The John Dewey Essays in Philosophy, 4. New York: Columbia University Press, 1993.

Quigley, Carroll. The Evolution Of Civilizations: an introduction to historical, Macmillin Company, New York, First edition published 1961; Liberty Fund, Inc., Indianapolis, IN, second edition published 1979

Early Muslim sociology

2005-10-17T21:09:00.000-07:00

Early Muslim sociology responded to the challenges of social organization of diverse peoples all under common religious organization in the (Click link for more info and facts about Islamic caliphate) Islamic caliphate, the (Click link for more info and facts about Abbasid) Abbasid and later (Click link for more info and facts about Mamluk) Mamluk period in Egypt. It was rooted in methods from (Click link for more info and facts about early Muslim philosophy) early Muslim philosophy and it reflected the strong concern of (The monotheistic religion of Muslims founded in Arabia in the 7th century and based on the teachings of Muhammad as laid down in the Koran) Islam with social cohesion.

Social responsibility in commerce

The development of (Click link for more info and facts about Islamic bank) Islamic banks and (Click link for more info and facts about Islamic economics) Islamic economics was a side effect of this (The study and classification of human societies) sociology: (The act of lending money at an exorbitant rate of interest) usury was rather severely restrained, no (The percentage of a sum of money charged for its use) interest rate was allowed, and investors were not permitted to escape the consequences of any failed venture - all financing was equity financing (Musharaka). In not letting borrowers bear all the risk/cost of a failure, an extreme disparity of outcomes between "partners" is thus avoided. Ultimately this serves a social harmony purpose.

Muslims also could not and cannot (in (The code of law derived from the Koran and from the teachings and example of Mohammed) shariah) finance any dealings in forbidden goods or activities e.g. alcohols, pork, gambling etc. Thus (Click link for more info and facts about ethical investing) ethical investing is the only acceptable investing, and (Click link for more info and facts about moral purchasing) moral purchasing is encouraged.

Ecological responsibility

Perhaps due to resource scarcity in most Islamic nations, there was an emphasis on limited (and some claim also sustainable) use of (Click link for more info and facts about natural capital) natural capital, i.e. producing land. Traditions of (Click link for more info and facts about haram) haram and (Click link for more info and facts about hima) hima and early (The branch of architecture dealing with the design and organization of urban space and activities) urban planning were expressions of strong social obligations to stay within (Click link for more info and facts about carrying capacity) carrying capacity and to preserve the natural environment as an obligation of (Click link for more info and facts about khalifa) khalifa or "stewardship".

Khaldun's conflict theory

Without doubt the most important figure in early Muslim sociology was (Click link for more info and facts about Ibn Khaldun) Ibn Khaldun, who conceived both a central social conflict ("town" versus "desert") as well as a theory (using the concept of a "generation") of the necessary loss of power of city conquerors coming from the desert.

Sati' al-Husri suggested that his (Click link for more info and facts about Muqaddimah) Muqaddimah is essentially a sociological work, sketching over its six books a general sociology; a sociology of politics; a sociology of urban life; a sociology of economics; and a sociology of knowledge.

Asibiyah

Khaldun's central concept of asabiyah, or "social cohesion," seems to anticipate modern conceptions of (Click link for more info and facts about social capital) social capital arising in (Click link for more info and facts about social network) social networks:

This cohesion arises spontaneously in tribes and other small kinship groups; and it can be intensified and enlarged by a religious ideology. Khaldun's analysis looks at how this cohesion carries groups to power but contains within itself the seeds - psychological, sociological, economic, political - of the group's downfall, to be replaced by a new group, dynasty or empire bound by a stronger (or at least younger and more vigorous) cohesion.

Interestingly, Khaldun's concept is instinctive and does not involve any (An implicit agreement among people that results in the organization of society; individual surrenders liberty in return for protection) social contract or explicit forms of (The act of forming something) constitution or other (Click link for more info and facts about instructional capital) instructional capital that would provide a basis for appeals, in law or otherwise.

Khaldun's economics

A similar (Any formal system of reasoning that arrives at the truth by the exchange of logical arguments) dialectic approach was taken to describe the sociological implications of tax choices, which is now of course part of (The branch of social science that deals with the production and distribution and consumption of goods and services and their management) economics:

"In the early stages of the state, taxes are light in their incidence, but fetch in a large revenue...As time passes and kings succeed each other, they lose their tribal habits in favor of more civilized ones. Their needs and exigencies grow...owing to the luxury in which they have been brought up. Hence they impose fresh taxes on their subjects...[and] sharply raise the rate of old taxes to increase their yield...But the effects on business of this rise in taxation make themselves felt. For business men are soon discouraged by the comparison of their profits with the burden of their taxes...Consequently production falls off, and with it the yield of taxation."

This analysis anticipates the modern economic concept known as the (A graph purporting to show the relation between tax rates and government income; income increases as tax rates increase up to an optimum beyond which income declines) Laffer Curve.

Khaldun's history

The (Click link for more info and facts about Muqaddimah) Muqaddimah further emphasized the role of (Click link for more info and facts about systemic bias) systemic bias in affecting the standard of evidence. Khaldun was quite concerned with the effect of raising standard of evidence when confronted with uncomfortable claims, and relaxing it when given claims that seemed reasonable or comfortable. He was a jurist, and sometimes participated reluctantly in rulings that he felt were coerced, based on arguments he didn't respect.

Unfortunately, there are few successors to Khaldun in his thinking about history until (English historian who studied the rise and fall of civilizations looking for cyclical patterns (1889-1975)) Arnold Toynbee, a 20th century British historian.

Similarity to modern sociology

Early Muslim sociology is more like that of (German philosopher whose three stage process of dialectical reasoning was adopted by Karl Marx (1770-1831)) Hegel or (Founder of modern communism; wrote the Communist Manifesto with Engels in 1848; wrote Das Kapital in 1867 (1818-1883)) Marx in emphasizing (Any formal system of reasoning that arrives at the truth by the exchange of logical arguments) dialectic or (A circuit that feeds back some of the output to the input of a system) feedback loops, or like (Click link for more info and facts about systems theory) systems theory as applied in such fields as (Click link for more info and facts about corporate social responsibility) corporate social responsibility, than it is like that of (German conductor and composer of Romantic operas (1786-1826)) Weber and others who emphasize structures. There is a remarkable similarity between modern economic ideas and the sociology and economics especially of Khaldun, who lived a remarkably eventful life.

Alcohol?

2005-10-17T20:03:00.000-07:00

NO ALCOHOL, ABSOLUTELY AND POSITIVELY!
by: Muhammad Ishaq Zahid Feb 25, 1998 updated: May 27, 98

Alcohol is a leading cause of traffic accidents and family disintegration in the United States. Of the 17,126 people killed in alcohol-related crashes in 1996, 3,732 involved drivers with blood-alcohol levels of under .10 percent, according to government statistics. A study done recently states that a small amount of alcohol consumption (2-3 glasses?) has some benefits for the heart. However, its evil far exceeds its good. Another medical study suggests that men who drink can cause birth defects to their babies. Is that so? According to a 10-year German study babies born with fetal alcohol syndrome suffer long-lasting brain damage, though many physical deformities diminsh over time. According to a 1988 study by the American Medical Association (AMA), it has been found that 100,000 deaths and $85.8 billion are linked to the abuse of alcohol, with 25 to 40 percent of hospital beds being occupied by people being treated for complications from alcoholism. This cost is more than that for drugs and tobacco put together. The question is are we prepared to pay this enormous cost? Should all of us share this cost equally? Should there be a tax on alcohol so that the health care costs of alcoholism are paid by its drinkers? Many states have raised the drinking age to 21, hoping to reduce fatalities. Should older people be allowed to drink, while forbidding the young adults? What does Stormin' Normin have to say about Desert Storm and alcohol? Does Allah, the God of all mankind, allow us to drink? Let us first talk about the age barriers and alcohol.

O you who believe! Why say you that which you don't do yourself? It is most hateful in the sight of God that you say that which you don't do yourself. (61:2-3)

It seems hypocritical for older people to restrict young adults from drinking while they themselves drink. This would be like a thief presiding as a judge at a burglary trial, a criminal acting as a policeman, or a sinner assuming the role of a preacher. The drinking age in most states has been raised to 21, on the grounds that, according to statistical evidence, younger drunken drivers cause more accidents than older ones. A visit to area hospitals can serve as an eye opener. Many patients have been paralyzed due to traffic accidents involving drunken drivers. I personally know of three Muslims who were victims of such accidents and had to be hospitalized. Laws banning or regulating the use of alcohol have accomplished very little. Society must have the will to rid itself from alcohol and its harmful effects. Individuals must practice self-restraint. Adults, in particular, must teach by example and practice what they preach.

Prophet Muhammad ( S.A.W.) said: "On the day of judgement a man will be brought and thrown into Hell; as a result of this his intestines will come out of his belly, and he will go circling holding his intestines like a donkey running a mill. His companions in Hell will come to him: 'O! So and So! What is this? Did you not ask people to do good and avoid vice?' He will say: 'That is so. I enjoined others to do good, but did not do it myself; and I forbade them to do evil but did it myself.' (Riyadh-us-Saleheen, Ch.24, No. 198)

Islam prohibits all intoxicants including wine and beer. This prohibition applies to all places at all times. People who believe in God obey Him and do not drink. Can you imagine Jesus, Moses, Jacob or Abraham getting intoxicated? These pious men were far above such foolishness. They were high and exalted, not by drugs and alcohol, but by their good deeds and noble aims.

MEN, ALCOHOL, AND BABIES!

June 8, 1991, 6pm news broadcast, reported by Leslie Lyles of local ABC TV...... A research study conducted by a Chicago doctor says that men who drink alcohol can cause birth defects to their babies. The study was done over a 12-year span. Doctors recommend that men avoid drinking alcohol for 2 to 3 months prior to conception. Shouldn't we raise the drinking age to 70 something? Listen, people, to what Allah says in The Quran:

"O ye who believe! Strong drinks and games of chance and idols and divining of arrows are only an infamy of Satan's handiwork. Leave them aside in order that ye may succeed. Satan seeketh only to cast among you enmity and hatred by means of strong drinks and games of chance, and turn you from remembrance of Allah and from His worship. So will ye not then abstain?" (5:90-91)

Alcohol Syndrome May Result in Long term Brain Damage!

Thursday, April 8, 1993, London by Associated Press .......According to a 10-year German study babies born with fetal alcohol syndrome suffer long-lasting brain damage, though many physical deformities diminsh over time. Doctors have suspected that fetal alcohol syndrome -- a condition associated with exposure to alcohol in the womb - causes chronic emotional and intellectual damage. But few scientists have traced affected children from birth to adolescence. The new study shows many of the physical deformities disappeared with time, but an array of emotional disturbances persisted, said Dr. Hans-Ludwig Sophr, a pediatrician at Rittberg Hospital of the German Red Cross in Berlin. Fetal alcohol syndrome, which strikes one to two babies in every 1,000 live births worldwide, describes a collection of features including a small head, stunted growth and delayed mental development. Doctors do not know the precise level of alcohol that damages the fetus. The study is being published in the April 10 issue of The Lancet, a medical journal. "This is an important study to document what's been reported anecdotally," said Dr. George Brennaman, a pediatrician at Johns Hopkins University in Maryland. Brennaman is associate director of the Center for American Indian and Alaskan Native Health. Fetal alcohol syndrome is two to three times as common among American Indians compared to the general population. Brennaman said he recommends abstinence during pregnancy. German investigators traced 36 boys and 24 girls born with fetal alcohol syndrome between 1977 and 1979. Doctors examined and scored babies according to the extent of physical and neurological damage shortly after birth and again about 10 years later. "...So will ye not abstain?"

$85.8 billion, 100,000 deaths and Alcohol

A study by the American Medical Association (1988)

According to a 1988 study by the American Medical Association (AMA), it has been found that 100,000 deaths and $85.8 billion are linked to the abuse of alcohol, with 25 to 40 percent of hospital beds being occupied by people being treated for complications from alcoholism. This cost is more than that for drugs and tobacco put together. The question is are we prepared to pay this enormous cost? Should all of us share this cost equally? Should there be a tax on alcohol so that the health care costs of alcoholism are paid by its drinkers? Would Anheuser-Busch allow you to enact such a law? Would such a tax suddenly become an infringement on your basic right to free speech etc. Personally, I would favor such a law since I do not drink and do not want my tax dollars spent on the care of drunken drivers. The rising cost of health care is arguably this nation's Number ONE problem. Every time you buy an American car, $500 go towards the health care of the the workers. The comparable figure is about $50 for Japan. So for two cars of the same price, you get that much less quality in an American car on the basis of health care alone. (Capacity utilization and the credit crunch cause a greater difference.) So do you and I want to pay for a problem that occupies 25 to 40 of hospital beds?

Here is the complete article:
CHICAGO (UPI) -- The American Medical Association Monday estimated lifestyle factors and social problems add $171 billion to the nation's health care bill. Dr. Daniel Johnson Jr., speaker of the AMA's House of Delegates, said billions of dollars are spent each year on medical conditions caused by violence, drug abuse, tobacco and alcohol -- all of which could be avoided. An AMA study of statistics from 1988 -- the last year for which statistics are available -- found 500,000 premature deaths annually and $22 billion in health care costs are directly attributable to cigarettes and other uses of tobacco. The study found 100,000 deaths and $85.8 billion linked to abuse of alcohol, with 25 to 40 percent of hospital beds being occupied by people being treated for complications from alcoholism. The AMA estimated drug abuse costs the system $58.3 billion for care, treatment and rehabilitation, as well as for lost productivity and crime enforcement. Street and domestic violence add $5.3 billion to U.S. health costs and are the fastest growing public health problems, Johnson said. The study also examined communicable and sexually transmitted diseases and found medical care for HIV-infected patients alone will total $15.2 billion by 1995. Some 400,000 people die annually as a result of failure to use such things as seat belts and smoke detectors, the study found. Other factors include failure to screen for and treat life-threatening diseases and treatable malignancies, dangerous recreational activities, abuse of addictive substances and engaging in unprotected sex. Other factors in the study include defensive medicine, which cost the system $15.1 billion in 1989. The study found per capita health care costs for those under the age of 65 are 72 percent of the national average, while per capita costs for those 85 and over are 750 percent of the national average. It also found that insurance protects most Americans from the real costs and therefore discourages cost-conscious decisions. ``We've known for years that these factors have been driving health care costs up,'' Johnson said. ``We cannot sucessfully resolve our current health care crisis unless we are willing to alter damaging patterns of behavior.''

STORMIN' NORMIN ON BEER

June 13, 1991... Gen. H. Norman Schwarzkopf, the commander of allied forces in the Persian Gulf War, told Congress that a lack of alcohol in the Gulf region made his troops better warriors. "Our sick call rate went down, our accident and injury rate went down, our incidents of indiscipline went down, and health of the force went up," the four-star general said. "So there were some very therapeutic outcomes from the fact that no alcohol was available whatsoever in the kingdom."

ALCOHOL HERE = tinat al-khabal in the HEREAFTER

A man from Yemen once asked the Prophet about a liquor made from millet called mizr which people drank in his country. The Prophet asked whether it was intoxicating and when the man replied in the affirmative, the Prophet(pbuh) said "Every intoxicant is prohibited. Allah has made a covenant regarding those who drink intoxicants to give them some tinat al-khabal to drink." He was asked what that was and he replied that it was the sweat of the inhabitants of hell, or the discharge of the inhabitants of hell. (Muslim) He who drinks alcohol ( wine,liquor or beer) in this world will be made to drink poison from Asawida (black and poisonous snakes) that will cause both the skin and the flesh of his face to fall into the vessel he drinks from. God Almighty shall accept neither the fasting, prayers nor even the pilgrimage of the one who drinks, brews, sells, or uses money obtained from selling alcohol unless he or she sincerely repents, vowing never to commit that evil again, and Allah accepts his or her repentance. Otherwise, that person will be made to drink the pus of Hell for every single drop of alcohol he or she had imbibed in this world.
Abdullah bin Umar related that the Prophet(pbuh) said: "Do not sit together with drinkers, nor visit them when they are sick. Do not even attend their funerals. The drinkers of alcohol shall come on the Last Day with black faces, their tongues leaning on one side and sliva coming out of their mouths. Anyone who sees their filthy appearance will know that they were the drinkers of alcohol." Wa'il al-Hadrami said that Tariq bin Suwaid asked the Prophet(pbuh) about wine and the Prophet(pbuh) forbade him. When Tariq told him that he made it only as a medicine, the Prophet(pbuh) replied, "It is not a medicine but a disease." (Muslim) Jabir reported the Messenger of Allah as saying "If a large amount of anything causes intoxication, a small amount of it is also prohibited." (Tirmidhi, Abu Daud and Ibn Majah)

In closing, let us hope that the followers of the prophets of God, be they Muslims, Christians or Jews, will abstain from all intoxicants and find true meaning in their own lives.

REFERENCES:

Prohibition of Alcohol in Islam, by Muhammad Samiullah (Pakistan), The Message International, Oct. - Dec. 1987, pp. 18 - 20; published by ICNA, 166-26, 89th Avenue, Jamaica, New York 11432.

"Alcohol paralyses the senses, makes one lurch, and vomit, extinguishes the feeble glimmer of reason which flickers in our poor minds. It soon overcomes the strongest man, and turns him into a raging beast who with empurpled face and bloodshot eyes, bellows forth oaths and threats against his surroundings and insults imaginary enemies. Never in any animal species, not among pigs, nor jackals, nor donkeys, is such ignominy to be found. The ugliest thing in creation is the drunkard, a repulsive being, the sight of whom makes one ashamed to belong to the same living species." (Dr Charles Richet, Paris - Nobel Prize Winner of Physiology)

"O ye who believe! Intoxicants and gambling...Are an abomination, - of Satan's handiwork: Shun such (abomination), That ye may prosper." - (Holy Quran 5:93)

What does a healthy Parent-Child relationship look like?

2005-10-17T19:59:00.000-07:00

The Parent-Child Relationship in Islam
By Dr. I.A. Arshed

(1) Rights of Parents (and Duties of children)

Islam recognises family as a basic social unit. Along with the husband-wife relationship the Parent-child relationship is the most important one. To maintain any social relationship both parties must have some clear-cut Rights as well as obligations. The relationships are reciprocal. Duties of one side are the Rights of the other side. So in Parent-child relationship the Rights of parents are the obligations (duties) of the children and vice versa, the Rights of children are obligations (duties) of parents. Islam clearly defines the Rights of Parents (which mean duties of children) and obligations of parents (which means Rights of children).

It is clear that after Allah parents are the persons who give us innumerable favors. They provide protection, food and clothing to the newly born. The mother sacrifices her comforts and sleep to provide comfort to her children. The father works hard to provide for their physical, educational and psychological (and spiritual) needs. It is a matter of common courtesy that if a person does you some favor you feel obliged to him. Verbally you say ‘thank you’ to him. You try to repay and compensate him for his gifts and favors. You feel a sense of gratitude towards him. So it is with Allah and with parents. Allah’s favors cannot be counted or repaid except by thanking Him and obeying His orders. After Allah our parents deserve our thanks and obedience for the favors they had done us. That’s why Quran lays stress on feeling grateful to parents, and doing good to them. “And your Lord has ordained that you shall worship none save Him and shall do your parents a good turn.” What does a ‘good turn’ mean? It includes obeying them, speaking softly, avoiding harsh words or harsh tone, giving them company when they are lonely, caring for their physical and psychological needs (especially in their old age), and praying to Allah that He may bless them and have mercy on them.
As between parents the mother has more rights than the father. The reason is apparent. Mother has borne the child’s burden during pregnancy, has undergone birth pains in delivering the baby, has sacrificed her own comforts to provide comfort to her children, has looked after them and felt worried for their well-being. That is why mother deserves our good treatment more than the father. A Tradition of the Prophet (PBUH) tells us that a Companion asked the Prophet, “ Who deserves my good treatment most?” “Your mother”, said the Prophet. “Who next?” “Your mother”. “Who next?” “Your mother”. “Who after that?” “Your father”. This means that the mother deserves three times more good treatment from her children than the father deserves. Another Tradition wants us to extend kind treatment to close relations on the mother’s side also (even to her friends). A famous Hadith (Tradition) says, “Paradise lies under the feet of the mother”. This means doing good to our mother lead us to Paradise.

As to the reward for doing good to our parents a Hadith mentions the following story: “Three persons of ancient days were once travelling in a mountaneous region. The rain, thunder and lightning made them take refuge in a cave. Mudslide made a stone block the opening to the cave. The persons were entrapped inside. When the storm stopped they tried to push back the heavy stone to get out of the cave but they could not. They wondered ‘what to do now’. At last seeing that their joint efforts also cannot move the stone they decided to pray to Allah sincerely. One of them suggested, ‘each one of us should relate one good thing he has done in his life and beg Allah to move the stone. One said, “One night my old mother asked me to bring a cup of milk for her. During the time I milched the goat and brought it to her she had gone to sleep. I did not think it proper to disturb her. So I stood by her bedside for the whole night till she got up in the morning and then I offered her the cup of milk. O God, if this act of mine was approved by You please shift this stone.” The stone slipped a little but not enough to let them get out. Similarly, the second and the third man mentioned an act of goodness and prayed to God to shift the stone. The stone slipped down and the entry to the cave opened up. So the men got out. This story shows how service to one’s parents leads to blessings from God and rescue from troubles. Now let us summarize the Rights of Parents (Duties of children):

(1) Right to be respected and obeyed:
Parents have a right to be respected and obeyed by children. All parents are well wishers of children. They issue orders and instructions that are in the best interest of children (though children might think ottherwise). So it is the duty of children to obey their orders and act accordingly. Some children listen to parental orders but do not act upon these or show laziness in carrying out these orders. This causes annoyance to parents. Children should remember that annoying one’s parents can lead to God’s wrath.

(2) Right to scold and rebuke:
It is instinctive obligation of parents to protect their children from physical and moral harm. If a small child puts its hand in fire it is natural urge for you to push the child back, even if the child does not want. It is in child’s interest. So it is with parents. They are duty bound to protect their children in every way, physical, intellectual, moral. If the children have a temptation to do an act that is not in their long-term interest it is the duty of the parents to keep them back from that act or behavior. To this end they may resort to advice, rebuke, scolding, even hitting them. Good children should take all this ‘harshness’ in their own interest. If parents scold them they should bear it calmly. No rude replies, no arguing, no explanations, no comments unless asked for. Parental advice should be listened to and acted upon, even if against children’s own wishes.

(3) Right to be looked after.
Parents have looked after the children for decades. So it is the duty of grown-up children to repay them by way of caring for them and looking to their physical and financial needs. A Quranic verse says: “People ask you (O Prophet) how should they spend. Say, ‘whatever you spend should be spent on Allah (in good cause), on parents, near relatives, on orphans, destitutes and travelers (who fall short of money in foreign lands)”.

(4) Right to be helped:
As parents grow old their energies also decline. So it is the duty of children to help their parents in any household chore in which they can help. Sons can help in lifting heavy things, cleaning home, arranging things etc. Daughters can help in mother’s household work—cooking, washing, cleaning, serving food etc. With good children such help should come automatically, not when asked for. Whenever you see your mother or father doing something extend a helping hand to her/him without their asking. This is what Islam expects from children.

(5) Right to kind words/good behaviour:
Quran urges children to be soft-spoken towards parents and show respect and kindness in their behavior towards parents.

Unforunate as it is, the Western societies have forgotten these lessons. Young children are rude towards parents and show disobedience. As the parents grow old they drive them out from their homes and put them in “Senior Citizens Homes”. Grown up children cannot spare time to attend to the needs of old parents. The busy Western life has led to a break-up of the family unit (so much upheld in Islam). As Muslims we expect our children to adhere to Islamic values and show respect, obedience, kindness, leniency and care towards parents, especially in their old age. Children must not forget the favors and sacrifices of their parents. As good mannered persons they must feel and remain obliged towards parents and try to repay them by kind words and deeds, even with money and material needs. These are the Rights of Parents due from their children (or the Duties of Children towards parents). These Rights and obligations are not found in Islam only. Such values are to be found in all true religions. Quran mentions Hazrat Yahya (John the Baptist) as “kind towards his parents, not tough and disobedient”. Similarly Hazrat Isa (Jesus) is quoted saying to his people, “God made me kind towards my mother (Mary) and did not make me tough and disobedient”. Hazrat Yousuf (Joseph), as a royal Minister in Egypt, called his old, poor parents from their far off home and offered them seats on a high platform (he did not feel shy of behaving in a kind manner to poor parents in the presence of his officials).

(6) Rights of Children
Now let us see the other side of the coin. We have mentioned that Parent-child relation is a reciprocal one. The Rights of Parents (discussed above) are the Duties of children. Now let us see what are the Rights of Children (and Duties of Parents) in Islam. These can be summarized as under:
(a) Children have the right to be fed, clothed and protected till they grow up to adulhood. It is, primarily, the duty of the father to do that. Mother can provide help if necessary. Protection means protection against physical as well as moral and intellectual harm. Parents are duty bound to see that the child’s personality develops in all fields. So if the parents have to resort to strictness for the sake of disciplining the children and protecting them from intellectually, morally and religiously undesirable behaviour, children should not resent their strictness. Let them perform their duty as parents. Children’s duty is not to protest or be rude but to listen and obey. “Their’s not to question why; their’s but to do and die”.

(b) Right to education.
In Islam education is not limited to bookish knowledge but includes moral and religious training also. It means healthy all-round growth of child’s personality. Parents must not only provide for children’s education in schools and colleges but should also take personal interest in their studies, helping them if they can. This gives children a feeling of ‘working with the parents’ and encourages them in studies. Parents should sacrifice their own comfort and social activities and must spare some time to take interest in children’s studies, especially when they are young. Leaving children to the mercy of teachers or tutors is not a wise policy. And of course, parents should not forget or neglect imparting religious/moral training to children. A little sacrifice on part of parents will save children from moral disasters. Effective moral training comes not from sermons, advice and precepts but from parents’ personal examples of good behaviour. It is a famous Tradition of the Prophet (PBUH) that acquisition of knowledge is a must for every Muslim boy and girl. Another Hadith says, “The best of you is one who gives a good education (intellectual and moral) to his children”. Another Hadith lays stress on education of daughters. The Prophet (PBUH) once said, “He who provides good upbringing to 3 daughters shall go to Paradise”. A man asked, “what if one has only two daughters”. “He also shall go to Paradise”. Another man asked, “and what if one has only one daughter?” “He too”, replied the Prophet (PBUH).

(c) Right to love and affection:
Children have many psychological needs also. Small children need to be loved, caressed, kissed and hugged. The Prophet loved children greatly. He would allow his grandsons Hassan and Hussain (R.A) to ride his shoulders even during his prayers. In streets he would offer ‘salaam’ to children, play and cut jokes with them. Sometimes he would even kiss small children in the street. Once a Bedouin saw the Prophet kissing a small kid. Out of wonder he said, “I have eight children but I never kiss them”. The Prophet remarked, “What can I do if Allah has taken away love and compassion from your heart”. The Prophet would show special kindness to orphaned children. Some parents believe that being frank with children is not good from discipline point of view. This is wrong. Love and leniency can do much that fear and strictness cannot do. If leniency leads to rudeness on the part of children it should be mixed with strictness. That will tell the children that parents are basically kind but can be tough if children show rudeness and bad manners. Over-protection and over-care are undesirable. Let the child grow up as a responsible person. Only provide them guidance.

(d) Right to be well provided (materially)
A Hadith says, “It is better for parents to leave their children well provided (financially) than to leave them in poverty”. This means that parents should not spend all that they have on their own comforts and luxuries but must make provisions for children’s welfare after the parents die. These are brief outlines of the Rights and Duties of both parties in the Parent-child relationship. If the parents and children act according to these guidelines they can make the family environment most conducive to peace and satisfaction for the parents and healthy personality growth for children. May Allah bless us all. AMEN.

What is a Civilized Family?

2005-10-17T19:57:00.000-07:00

The Civilized Family
by Sayyid Qutb

If the family is the basis of the society, and the basis of the family is the division of labor between husband and wife, and the upbringing of children is the most important function of the family, then such a society is indeed civilized.

In the Islamic system of life, this kind of a family provides the environment under which human values and morals develop and grow in the new generation; these values and morals cannot exist apart from the family unit. If, on the other hand, free sexual relationship and illegitimate children become the basis of a society, and if the relationship between man and woman is based on lust, passion and impulse, and the division of work is not based on family responsibility and natural gifts; if the role of women is merely to be attractive, sexy and flirtatious, and if women are freed from their basic responsibility of bringing up children; and if, on her own or under social demand, she prefers to become a hostess or a stewardess in a hotel or ship or air company, thus using her ability for material productivity rather than the training of human beings, because material production is considered to be more important, more valuable and more honourable than the development of human character, then such a civilisation is 'backward' from the human point of view, or 'jahili' in Islamic terminology.

The family system and the relationship between the sexes determine the whole character of a society and whether it is backward or civilised, jahili or Islamic. Those societies which give ascendance to physical desires and animalistic morals cannot be considered civilised, no matter how much progress they may make in industry or science. This is the only measure which does not err in guarding true human progress. In all modern jahili societies, the meaning of 'morality' is limited to such an extent that all those aspects which distinguish man from animal are considered beyond its sphere. In these societies, illegitimate sexual relationships even homosexuality, are not considered immoral. The meaning of ethics is limited to economic affairs or sometimes to political affairs which fall into the category of 'government interests'.

Among jahili societies, writers and journalists advise both married and unmarried people that free sexual relationships are not immoral. However, it is immoral if a boy uses his partner, or a girl uses her partner, for sex, while feeling no love in his or her heart. It is bad if a wife continues to guard her chastity while her love for her husband has vanished; it is admirable if she finds another lover... From the point of view of 'human' progress, all such societies are not civilised but are backward. The line of human progress goes upward from animal desires toward higher values. To control the animal desires, a progressive society lays down the foundation of a family system in which human desires find satisfaction, as well as providing for the future generation to be brought up in such a manner that it will continue the human civilisation, in which human characteristics flower to their full bloom.

Obviously a society which intends to control the animal characteristics, while providing full opportunities for the development and perfection of human characteristics, requires strong safeguards for the peace and stability of the family, so that it may perform its basic task free from the influences of impulsive passions. On the other hand, if in a society immoral teachings and poisonous suggestions are rampant, and sexual activity is considered outside the sphere of morality, then in that society the humanity of man can hardly find a place to develop. Thus, only Islamic values and morals, Islamic teachings and safeguards, are worthy of mankind, and form this unchanging and true measure of human progress, Islam is the real civilisation and Islamic society is truly civilised.

The Spiritual Path in Islam

2005-10-17T19:55:00.000-07:00

What is the spiritual path in Islam and what is its place in the life as a whole? To answer this it is necessary to study carefully the difference between the Islamic concept of spirituality and that of other religions and ideologies. Without a clear understanding of this difference it often happens that, when talking about the spirituality in Islam, many of the vague notions associated with the word ‘spiritual’ unconsciously come to mind; it then becomes difficult for one to comprehend that this spirituality of Islam not only transcends the dualism of spirit and matter but is the nucleus of its integrated and unified concept of life.

This is a new and revised translation of a talk given by the author on Radio Pakistan, Lahore on 16th March, 1948.

The Spiritual Path in Islam
by Maulana Sayyed Abul 'Ala Maududi

Body-Soul Conflict

The idea which has influenced most the climate of philosophical and religious thought is that body and soul are mutually antagonistic, and can develop only at each other’s expense. For the soul, the body is a prison and the activities of daily life are the shackles which keep it in bondage and arrest its growth. This has inevitably led to the universe being divided into the spiritual and the secular.

Those who chose the secular path were convinced that they could not meet the demands of spirituality, and thus they led highly material and hedonistic lives. All spheres of worldly activity, whether social, political, economic or cultural, were deprived of the light of spirituality; injustice and tyranny were the result.

Conversely, those who wanted to tread the path of spiritual excellence came to see themselves as ‘noble outcasts’ from the world. They believed that it was impossible for spiritual growth to be compatible with a ‘normal’ life. In their view physical self-denial and mortification of the flesh were necessary for the development and perfection of the spirit. They invented spiritual exercises and ascetic practices which killed physical desires and dulled the body’s senses. They regarded forests, mountains and other solitary places as ideal for spiritual development because the hustle and bustle of life would not interfere with their meditations. They could not conceive of spiritual development except through withdrawal from the world.

This conflict of body and soul resulted in the evolution of two different ideals for the perfection of man. One was that man should be surrounded by all possible material comforts and regard himself as nothing but an animal. Men learnt to fly like birds, swim like fish, run like horses and even terrorize and destroy like wolves ¾ but they did not learn how to live like noble human beings. The other was that the senses should be not only subdued and conquered but extra-sensory powers awakened and the limitations of the sensory world done away with. With these new conquests men would be able to hear distant voices like powerful wireless sets, see remote objects as one does with a telescope, and develop powers through which the mere touch of their hand or a passing glance would heal the unhealable.

The Islamic viewpoint differs radically from these approaches. According to Islam, Allah has appointed the human soul as His Khalifah (vicegerent) in this world. He has invested it with a certain authority, and given it certain responsibilities and obligations for the fulfillment of which He has endowed it with the best and most suitable physical frame. The body has been created with the sole object of allowing the soul to use it in the exercise of its authority and the fulfillment of its duties and responsibilities. The body is not a prison for the soul, but its workshop or factory; and if the soul is to grow and develop, it is only through this workshop. Consequently, this world is not a place of punishment in which the human soul unfortunately finds itself, but a field in which Allah has sent it to work and do its duty towards Him.

So spiritual development should not take the form of a man turning away from this workshop and retreating into a corner. Rather, man should live and work in it, and give the best account of himself that he can. It is in the nature of an examination for him; every aspect and sphere of life is, as it were, a question paper: the home, the family, the neighborhood, the society, the market-place, the office, the factory, the school, the law courts, the police station, the parliament, the peace conference and the battlefield, all represent question papers which man has been called upon to answer. If he leaves most of the answer-book blank, he is bound to fail the examination. Success and development are only possible if man devotes his whole life to this examination and attempts to answer all the question papers he can.

Islam rejects and condemns the ascetic view of life, and proposes a set of methods and processes for the spiritual development of man, not outside this world but inside it. the real place for the growth of the spirit is in the midst of life and not in solitary places of spiritual hibernation.

Criterion of Spiritual Development

We shall now discuss how Islam judges the development or decay of the soul. In his capacity as the vicegerent (Khalifah) of God, man is answerable to Him for all his activities. It is his duty to use all the powers which he has been given in accordance with the Divine will. He should utilize to the fullest extent all the faculties and potentialities bestowed upon him for seeking Allah’s approval. In his dealings with other people he should behave in such a way as to try to please Allah. In brief, all his energies should be directed towards regulating the affairs of this world in the way in which Allah wants them to be regulated. The better a man does this, with a sense of responsibility, obedience and humility, and with the object of seeking the pleasure of the Lord, the nearer will he be to Allah. In Islam, spiritual development is synonymous with nearness to Allah. Similarly, he will not be able to get near to Allah if he is lazy and disobedient. And distance from Allah signifies, in Islam, the spiritual fall and decay of man.

From the Islamic point of view, therefore, the sphere of activity of the religious man and the secular man is the same. Not only will both work in the same spheres; the religious man will work with greater enthusiasm than the secular man. The man of religion will be as active as the man of the world ¾ indeed, more active ¾ in his domestic and social life, which extends from the confines of the household to the market square, and even to international conferences.

What will distinguish their actions will be the nature of their relationship with Allah and the aims behind their actions. Whatever a religious man does, will be done with the feeling that he is answerable to Allah, that he must try to secure Divine pleasure, that his actions must be in accordance with Allah’s laws. A secular person will be indifferent towards Allah and will be guided in his actions only by his personal motives. This difference makes the whole of the material life of a man of religion a totally spiritual venture, and the whole of the life of a secular person an existence devoid of the spark of spirituality.

The Road to Spirituality

The first necessity for progression along the path of spiritual development is MAN (faith). The mind and heart of a man should always be aware: Allah alone is His Master, Sovereign and Deity; seeking His pleasure is the aim of all his endeavors; and His commands alone are the commands that are to be obeyed. This should be a firm conviction, based not merely on the intellect, but also on acceptance by the will. The stronger and deeper this conviction, the more profound a man’s faith will be.

The second stage is that of obedience (it~ ’at), meaning that man gives up his independence and accepts subservience to Allah. This subservience is called § slam (submission) in the language of the Qur’~ n. Thus, man should not only acknowledge Allah as his Lord and Sovereign but should actually submit before Him and fashion his entire life in obedience to Him.

The third stage is that of taqw~ (Allah-consciousness). It consists in a practical manifestation of one’s faith in Allah in one’s daily life. Taqw~ also means desisting from everything which Allah has forbidden or has disapproved of; man must be in a state of readiness to undertake all that Allah has commanded and to observe the distinctions between lawful and unlawful, right and wrong, and good and bad in life.

The last and the highest stage is that of ihs~ n (godliness) It signifies that man has attained highest excellence in words, deeds and thoughts, identifying his will with the will of Allah and harmonizing it, to the best of his knowledge and ability, with the Divine will. He thus begins to like what is liked by the Lord and to dislike what He dislikes. Man should then not only avoid evil, for it displeases his Lord, but should use all his powers to eradicate it from the face of the earth; he should not be content with adorning himself with the good which Allah wants to flourish but should also strive to attain and propagate it in the world, even at the cost of his life. A man who reaches this stage attains the highest pinnacle of spirituality and is nearest to Allah.

This path of spiritual development is not meant for individuals only but for communities and nations as well. Like individuals, a community, after passing through the various stages of spiritual elevation may reach the ultimate stage of ihs~ n a state also, through all its administrative machinery, may become mu’min (faithful), muslim (obedient), muttaq§ (God-conscious) and muhsin (godly). In fact, the ideals aimed at by Islam are fully achieved only when the whole community accepts them and a muttaq§ and muhsin state comes into existence. The highest form of civilization, based on goodness, is then reached.

Let us now look at the mechanism of spiritual training which Islam has laid down to prepare individuals and society for this process.

The methods that Islam lays down for spiritual development rest, in addition, obviously, to faith (Im~ n), on five pillars.

The first is the Prayer (Salat), which brings man into communion with Allah five times a day, reviving his remembrance, reiterating his fear, developing his love, reminding him of this Divine commands again, and thus preparing him for obedience to Allah. It is obligatory to offer some of these Prayers in Congregation as well so that the whole community and society may be prepared to journey on the path of spiritual development.

The second is the Fast (Sawm), which for a full month every year trains each man individually, and the Muslim community as a whole, in righteousness and self-restraint,; it enables society, the rich and the poor alike, to experience hunger, and prepares people to undergo any hardships in their search to please Allah.

The third is the Almsgiving (Zakat), which develops the sense of monetary sacrifice, sympathy and co-operation among Muslims. There are people who wrongly interpret Zakat as a tax; in fact, the spirit underlying Zakat is entirely different from that of a tax. The real meaning of Zakat is sublimity and purification. By using this word, Islam seeks to impress on man the fact that, inspired by a true love of Allah, the monetary help which he renders to his brethren will uplift and purify his soul.

The fourth is the Pilgrimage (Hajj), which aims at fostering that universal brotherhood of the faithful which is based on the worship of Allah, and which results in a worldwide movement that has been responding to the call of Truth throughout the centuries and will, Allah willing, go on answering this call till eternity.

The last is Jihad, that is, exerting oneself to the utmost to disseminate the word of Allah and to make it supreme, and to remove all the impediments to Islam ¾ through tongue or pen or sword. the aim is to live a life of dedication to the cause of Allah and, if necessary, to sacrifice one’s life in the discharge of this mission. This is the highest spirituality, rooted in the real world, which Islam wants to cultivate. Life-affirmation based on goodness and piety, and not life-denial, is what Islam stands for. And this lends a unique character to Islam.

The Moral System of Islam

2005-10-17T19:53:00.001-07:00

The Moral System of Islam
by Maulana Sayyed Abul 'Ala Maududi

A moral sense is inborn in man and, through the ages, it has served as the common man’s standard of moral behaviour, approving certain qualities and condemning others. While this instinctive faculty may vary from person to person, human conscience has consistently declared certain moral qualities to be good and others to be bad.

Justice, courage and truthfulness have always found praise, and history does not record any period worth the name in which falsehood, injustice, dishonesty and breach of trust have been praised; sympathy, compassion, loyalty and generosity have always been valued, while selfishness, cruelty, meanness and bigotry have never been approved of by society; men have always appreciated perseverance, determination and courage, but never impatience, fickleness, cowardice and stupidity. Dignity, restraint, politeness and friendliness have throughout the ages been counted virtues, whereas snobbery and rudeness have always been looked down upon. People with a sense of responsibility and devotion to duty have always won the highest regard, those who are incompetent, lazy and lacking in a sense of duty have never been looked upon with approval.

Similarly, in assessing the standards of good and bad in the collective behaviour of society as a whole, only those societies have been considered worthy of honour which have possessed the virtues of organisation, discipline, mutual attention and compassion and which have established a social order based on justice, freedom and equality. Disorganisation, indiscipline, anarchy, disunity, injustice and social privilege have always been considered manifestations of decay and disintegration in a society. Robbery, murder, larceny, adultery and corruption have always been condemned. Slander and blackmail have never been considered healthy social activities, while service and care of the aged, helping one’s relatives, regard for neighbours, loyalty to friends, aiding the weak, the destitute and the orphans, and nursing the sick are qualities which have been highly valued since the dawn of civilisation.

Individuals who are honest, sincere and dependable, whose deeds match their words, who are content with their own rightful possessions, who are prompt in the discharge of their obligations to others, who live in peace and let others live in peace, and from whom nothing but good can be expected, have always formed the basis of any healthy human society.

These examples show that human moral standards are universal and have been well-known to mankind throughout the ages. Good and evil are not myths, but realities well understood by all. A sense of good and evil is inherent in the very nature of man. Hence in the terminology of the Qur’an good is called Ma’rif (a well-known thing) and evil munkar (an unknown thing); that is to say, good is known to be desirable and evil is known not to commend itself in any way. As the Qur’an says: Allah has revealed to human nature the consciousness and cognition of good and evil. (al-Shams 91: 8)

This is a new and revised translation of a talk given by the author on Radio Pakistan, Lahore, on 6th January, 1948.

Why Differences?

The question that now arises is: if what constitutes good and evil is so clear and universally agreed, why do varying patterns of moral behaviour exist in the world? Why are there so many conflicting moral philosophies? Why do certain moral standards contradict each other? What lies at the root of other differences? What is the unique position of Islam in the context of other ethical systems? On what grounds can we claim that Islam has a perfect moral system? And what exactly is the distinctive contribution of Islam in the realm of ethics?

Although these are important questions and must be squarely faced, justice cannot be done to them in the brief span of this talk. So I shall restrict myself to a summary of some of the points crucial to any critical examination of contemporary ethical systems and conflicting patterns of moral behaviour:

(a) Through their failure to prescribe specific limits and roles for the various moral virtues and values, present-day moral structures cannot provide a balanced and coherent plan of social conduct.

(b) The real cause of the differences in the moral systems seems to lie in their offering different standards for judging what constitutes good and bad actions and in their laying down different ways to distinguish good from evil. Differences also exist in respect of the sanction behind the moral law and in regard to the motives which impel a person to follow it.

(c) On deeper reflect we find that the grounds for these differences emerge from different peoples’ conflicting views and concepts of the universe, the place of man in it, and of man’s purpose on earth. The various systems of ethics, philosophy and religion are in fact a record of the vast divergence of views on such vital questions as: Is there an Allah of the universe and, if there is, is He the only one or are there many Allahs? What are the Divine attributes? What is the nature of the relationship between Allah and human beings? Has He made any arrangements for guiding humanity through the vicissitudes of life or not? Is man answerable to Him or not? And if so, in what spheres of his life? Is there an ultimate aim of man’s creation which he should keep in view throughout his life? The ethical philosophy and the pattern of moral behaviour of the individual and society.

It is difficult for me, in this brief talk, to take stock of the various ethical systems in the world and indicate what solutions each one of them has proposed to these questions and what has been the impact of these answers on the moral evolution of the society believing in these concepts. Here I have to confine myself to the Islamic concept only.

The Islamic Concept of Life and Morality

The viewpoint of Islam is that the universe is the creation of Allah who is One. He alone is its Master, Sovereign and Sustainer, and it is functioning under His command. He is All-powerful and Omniscient, he is subbã h and Quddã s (that is, free from all defects, mistakes, weaknesses and faults and is holy in every respect). His godhood is free from partiality and injustice.

Man is His creature, subject and servant and is born to serve and obey Him. These correct course of life for man is to live in complete obedience to Him. And it is for Allah, not man, to determine the mode of that worship and obedience.

At certain times Allah has raised Prophets for the guidance of humanity and has revealed His books through them. It is the duty of man to live his life according to the dictates of Allah and to follow the Divine guidance.

Man is answerable to Allah for all his actions and will be called on to render an account of them in the Hereafter. Man’s short life on earth is really an opportunity to prepare for that great test. He will be impartially assessed on his conduct in life by a Being who keeps a complete record not merely of his movements and actions and their influence on all that is in the world ¾ from the tiniest speck of dust to the highest mountains ¾ but also of his innermost thoughts and feelings and intentions.

The Goal of Moral Effort

This concept of the universe and of man’s place in it indicates the real and ultimate good which should be the object of all mankind’s endeavours ¾ ‘seeking the pleasure of Allah. This is the standard by which Islam judges all conduct. It means that man is not left like a ship without moorings at the mercy of winds and tides; instead, we have a set of unchangeable norms for all moral actions. Moreover, by making the ‘pleasure of Allah’ the object of man’s life, unlimited possibilities are opened for man’s moral evolution, untainted by narrow selfishness or racism or chauvinism.

Islam also furnishes us with the means to determine good and evil conduct. It does not base our knowledge of evil and virtue on mere intellect, desire, intuition or experience derived through the senses, which constantly undergo changes and modifications and thus fail to provide definite and unchanging standards of morality. Instead, it provides us with an objective source, the Divine revelation, as embodied in the Book of Allah and the Sunnah (way of life) of the Prophet, blessings and peace be on him. This source prescribes a standard of moral conduct that is permanent and universal and holds good in every age and under all circumstances.

The moral code of Islam ranges from smallest details of domestic life to the field of national and international behaviour. It guides us at every stage in life and makes us free from exclusive dependence on other sources of knowledge, although we may, of course, use these as an aid to this primary source.

Sanction Behind Morality

This concept of the universe and of man’s place in it also provides the sanction that must lie at the back of every moral law, that is, the love and fear of Allah, the sense of accountability on the Day of Judgment and the promise of eternal bliss and reward in the Hereafter. Although Islam aims to cultivate a mass ethos which may induce individuals and groups to observe the principles of morality it lays down as well as helps the evolution of a political system which will enforce the moral law through its legislative and executive powers, Islam’s moral law does not really depend on these external factors. It relies on the inherent desire for good in every man which is derived from belief in Allah and the Day of Judgment. Before laying down any moral injunctions, Islam seeks to implant firmly in man’s heart the conviction that his dealings are with Allah, who sees him at all times and in all places; that he may hide himself from the whole world but not from Allah; that he may deceive everyone but Allah; that he can flee from the power of any person but not from Allah; that while the world can see only man’s outward life, Allah knows his innermost intentions and desires; that while man may, in his short sojourn on earth, do whatever he likes, he has to die one day and preset himself before the Divine court of justice where no special pleading or deception will be of any avail and where his future will be decided with complete impartiality. It is this belief in accountability to Allah which is the real force behind the moral law of Islam. If public opinion and the powers of the state give it support, so much the better; otherwise, this faith alone can keep a Muslim individual and a Muslim community on the straight path of virtue.

Motives and Incentives

The fact that a man voluntarily and willingly accepts Allah as his Creator and obedience to Allah as the aim of his life and strives to seek His pleasure in his every action provides sufficient incentive to obey the commandments which he believes to be from Allah. Belief that whoever obeys the Divine commands is sure to be rewarded in the Hereafter, whatever difficulties he may have to face in his life on earth, is another strong incentive for leading a virtuous life. and the belief that breaking the commandments of Allah will mean eternal punishment is an effective deterrent against violation of the moral law, however tempted a man may be by the superficial attractiveness of a certain course of action. If this hope and fear are firmly ingrained in one’s heart, they will inspire virtuous deeds even on occasions when the immediate consequences may appear to be very damaging, and they will keep one away from evil even when it looks extremely attractive and profitable.

This clearly indicates that Islam possesses a distinctive criterion of good and evil, its own source of moral law, and its own sanctions and motivating force; through them it shapes the generally recognised moral virtues in all spheres of life into a balanced and comprehensive scheme and ensures that they are followed. It can therefore be justifiably claimed that Islam possesses a perfect moral system of its own. This system has many distinguishing features and I shall refer to three of the most significant ones which, in my opinion, form its special contribution to ethics.

Distinctive Features

1. By setting Divine pleasure as the objective of man’s life, Islam has set the highest possible standard of morality providing boundless possibilities for the moral evolution of humanity. By making Divine revelation the primary source of knowledge, it gives permanence and stability to moral standards, while at the same time allowing scope for reasonable flexibility and adjustment, though not for perversions or moral laxity. The love and fear of Allah become the real motives, which impel man to obey the moral law without external pressures. And through belief in Allah and the Day of Judgment, we are motivated to behave morally with earnestness and sincerity.

2. The Islamic moral order does not, through a mistaken love of originality and innovation, seek to lay down any new moral standards; nor does it seek to minimise the importance of the well-known moral standards, or give exaggerated importance to some and neglect others without cause. It takes all the recognised morals and assigns a suitable role to each within the total scheme of life. It widens the scope of their application to cover every aspect of man’s private and social life ¾ his domestic associations, his civic conduct, and his activities in the political, economic, legal and educational fields. It covers his life at home and in society, literally from the cradle to the grave. No sphere of life is exempt from the universal and comprehensive application of the moral principles of Islam. These ensure that the affairs of life, instead of being dominated by selfish desires and petty interests, are regulated by the dictates of morality.

3. The Islamic moral order guarantees for man a system of life which is free from all evil. It calls on the people not only to practise virtue, but also to eradicate vice. Those who respond to this call are gathered together into a community (Ummah) and given the name ‘Muslims’. The main purpose underlying the formation of this community is that it should make an organised effort to establish and enforce goodness and suppress and eradicate evil. It would be a day of morning for this community and a bad day for the entire world if its efforts were at any time directed towards establishing evil and suppressing good.

Maulana Sayyed Abul 'Ala Maududi

2005-10-17T19:41:00.000-07:00

Abul A’la was born on Rajab 3, 1321 AH (September 25, 1903 AD) in Aurangabad, a well-known town in the former princely state of Hyderabad (Deccan), presently Maharashtra, India. Born in a respectable family, his ancestry on the paternal side is traced back to the Holy Prophet Muhammad (peace and blessing of Allah be on him).

Sayyid Abul A'la Maududi
(1903-1979)

The family had a long-standing tradition of spiritual leadership and a number of Maududi’s ancestors were outstanding leaders of Sufi Orders. One of the luminaries among them, the one from whom he derived his family name, was Khawajah Qutb al-Din Maudud (d. 527 AH), a renowned leader of the Chishti Sufi Order. Maududi’s forefathers had moved to the Subcontinent from Chisht towards the end of the 9^th century of the Islamic calendar (15^th century of the Christian calendar). The first one to arrive was Maududi’s namesake, Abul A’la Maududi (d. 935 AH).Maududi’s father, Ahmad Hasan, born in 1855 AD, a lawyer by profession, was a highly religious and devout person. Abul A’la was the youngest of his three sons.

Educational & Intellectual Growth:

After acquiring early education at home, Abul A’la was admitted in Madrasah Furqaniyah, a high school which attempted to combine the modern Western with the traditional Islamic education. After successfully completing his secondary education, young Abul A’la was at the stage of undergraduate studies at Darul Uloom, Hyderabad, when his formal education was disrupted by the illness and eventual death of his father. This did not deter Maududi from continuing his studies though these had to be outside of the regular educational institutions. By the early 1920s, Abul A’la knew enough Arabic, Persian and English, besides his mother-tongue, Urdu, to study the subjects of his interest independently. Thus, most of what he learned was self-acquired though for short spells of time he also received systematic instruction and guidance from some competent scholars. Thus, Maududi’s intellectual growth was largely a result of his own effort and the stimulation he received from his teachers. Moreover, his uprightness, his profound regard for propriety and righteousness largely reflect the religious piety of his parents and their concern for his proper moral upbringing.

Involvement in Journalism:

After the interruption of his formal education, Maududi turned to journalism in order to make his living. In 1918, he was already contributing to a leading Urdu newspaper, and in 1920, at the age of 17, he was appointed editor of Taj, which was being published from Jabalpore, a city in the province now called Madhya Pradesh, India. Late in 1920, Maududi came to Delhi and first assumed the editorship of the newspaper Muslim (1921-23), and later of al-Jam’iyat (1925-28), both of which were the organs of the Jam’iyat-i ‘Ulama-i Hind, an organisation of Muslim religious scholars. Under his editorship, al-Jam’iyat became the leading newspaper of the Muslims of India.

Interest in Politics:

Around the year 1920, Maududi also began to take some interest in politics. He participated in the Khilafat Movement, and became associated with the Tahrik-e Hijrat, which was a movement in opposition to the British rule over India and urged the Muslims of that country to migrate en masse to Afghanistan. However, he fell foul of the leadership of the movement because of his insistence that the aims and strategy of the movement should be realistic and well-planned. Maududi withdrew more and more into academic and journalistic pursuits.

First Book:

During 1920-28, Maulana Maududi also translated four different books, one from Arabic and the rest from English. He also made his mark on the academic life of the Subcontinent by writing his first major book, al-Jihad fi al-Islam. This is a masterly treatise on the Islamic law of war and peace. It was first serialised in al-Jam’iyat in 1927 and was formally published in 1930. It was highly acclaimed both by the famous poet-philosopher Muhammad Iqbal (d. 1938) and Maulana Muhammad Ali Jauhar (d. 1931), the famous leader of the Khilafat Movement. Though written during his ’20s, it is one of his major and most highly regarded works.

Research & Writings:

After his resignation from al-Jam’iyat in 1928, Maududi moved to Hyderabad and devoted himself to research and writing. It was in this connection that he took up the editorship of the monthly Tarjuman al-Qur’an in 1933, which since then has been the main vehicle for the dissemination of Maududi’s ideas. He proved to be a highly prolific writer, turning out several scores of pages every month. Initially, he concentrated on the exposition of ideas, values and basic principles of Islam. He paid special attention to the questions arising out of the conflict between the Islamic and the contemporary Western whorl. He also attempted to discuss some of the major problems of the modern age and sought to present Islamic solutions to those problems. He also developed a new methodology to study those problems in the context of the experience of the West and the Muslim world, judging them on the theoretical criterion of their intrinsic soundness and viability and conformity with the teachings of the Qur’an and the Sunnah. His writings revealed his erudition and scholarship, a deep perception of the significance of the teachings of the Qur’an and the Sunnah and a critical awareness of the mainstream of Western thought and history. All this brought a freshness to Muslim approach to these problems and lent a wider appeal to his message.

In the mid ’30s, Maududi started writing on major political and cultural issues confronting the Muslims of India at that time and tried to examine them from the Islamic perspective rather than merely from the viewpoint of short-term political and economic interests. He relentlessly criticised the newfangled ideologies which had begun to cast a spell over the minds and hearts of his brethren-in-faith and attempted to show the hollowness of those ideologies. In this connection, the idea of nationalism received concerted attention from Maududi when he forcefully explained its dangerous potentialities as well as its incompatibility with the teachings of Islam. Maududi also emphasised that nationalism in the context of India meant the utter destruction of the separate identity of Muslims. In the meantime, an invitation from the philosopher-poet Allama Muhammad Iqbal persuaded him to leave Hyderabad and settle down at a place in the Eastern part of Punjab, in the district of Pathankot. Maududi established what was essentially an academic and research centre called Darul-Islam where, in collaboration with Allama Iqbal, he planned to train competent scholars in Islamics to produce works of outstanding quality on Islam, and above all, to carry out the reconstruction of Islamic Thought.

Founding the Party:

Around the year 1940, Maududi developed ideas regarding the founding of a more comprehensive and ambitious movement and this led him to launch a new organisation under the name of the Jamaat-e-Islami. Maududi was elected Jamaat’s first Ameer and remained so till 1972 when he withdrew from the responsibility for reasons of health.

Struggle & Persecution:

After migrating to Pakistan in August 1947, Maududi concentrated his efforts on establishing a truly Islamic state and society in the country. Consistent with this objective, he wrote profusely to explain the different aspects of the Islamic way of life, especially the socio-political aspects. This concern for the implementation of the Islamic way of life led Maududi to criticise and oppose the policies pursued by the successive governments of Pakistan and to blame those in power for failing to transform Pakistan into a truly Islamic state. The rulers reacted with severe reprisal measures. Maududi was often arrested and had to face long spells in prison.

During these years of struggle and persecution, Maududi impressed all, including his critics and opponents, by the firmness and tenacity of his will and other outstanding qualities. In 1953, when he was sentenced to death by the martial law authorities on the charge of writing a seditious pamphlet on the Qadyani problem, he resolutely turned down the opportunity to file a petition for mercy. He cheerfully expressed his preference for death to seeking clemency from those who wanted, altogether unjustly, to hang him for upholding the right. With unshakeable faith that life and death lie solely in the hands of Allah, he told his son as well as his colleagues: "If the time of my death has come, no one can keep me from it; and if it has not come, they cannot send me to the gallows even if they hang themselves upside down in trying to do so." His family also declined to make any appeal for mercy. His firmness astonished the government which was forced, under strong public pressure both from within and without, to commute the death sentence to life imprisonment and then to cancel it.

Intellectual Contribution:

Maulana Maududi has written over 120 books and pamphlets and made over a 1000 speeches and press statements of which about 700 are available on record.

Maududi’s pen was simultaneously prolific, forceful and versatile. The range of subjects he covered is unusually wide. Disciplines such as Tafsir, Hadith, law, philosophy and history, all have received the due share of his attention. He discussed a wide variety of problems C political, economic, cultural, social, theological etc. C and attempted to state how the teachings of Islam were related to those problems. Maududi has not delved into the technical world of the specialist, but has expounded the essentials of the Islamic approach in most of the fields of learning and inquiry. His main contribution, however, has been in the fields of the Qur’anic exegesis (Tafsi), ethics, social studies and the problems facing the movement of Islamic revival. His greatest work is his monumental tafsir in Urdu of the Qur’an, Tafhim al-Qur’an, a work he took 30 years to complete. Its chief characteristic lies in presenting the meaning and message of the Qur’an in a language and style that penetrates the hearts and minds of the men and women of today and shows the relevance of the Qur’an to their everyday problems, both on the individual and societal planes. He translated the Qur’an in direct and forceful modern Urdu idiom. His translation is much more readable and eloquent than ordinary literal translations of the Qur’an. He presented the Qur’an as a book of guidance for human life and as a guide-book for the movement to implement and enforce that guidance in human life. He attempted to explain the verses of the Qur’an in the context of its total message. This tafsir has made a far-reaching impact on contemporary Islamic thinking in the Subcontinent, and through its translations, even abroad.

The influence of Maulana Maududi is not confined to those associated with the Jamaat-e-Islami. His influence transcends the boundaries of parties and organisations. Maududi is very much like a father-figure for Muslims all over the world. As a scholar and writer, he is the most widely read Muslim writer of our time. His books have been translated into most of the major languages of the world C Arabic, English, Turkish, Persian, Hindi, French, German, Swahili, Tamil, Bengali, etc. C and are now increasingly becoming available in many more of the Asian, African and European languages.

Travels & Journeys Abroad:

The several journeys which Maududi undertook during the years 1956-74 enabled Muslims in many parts of the world to become acquainted with him personally and appreciate many of his qualities. At the same time, these journeys were educative for Maududi himself as well as they provided to him the opportunity to gain a great deal of first-hand knowledge of the facts of life and to get acquainted with a large number of persons in different parts of the world. During these numerous tours, he lectured in Cairo, Damascus, Amman, Makkah, Madinah, Jeddah, Kuwait, Rabat, Istanbul, London, New York, Toronto and at a host of international centres. During these years, he also participated in some 10 international conferences. He also made a study tour of Saudi Arabia, Jordan (including Jerusalem), Syria and Egypt in 1959-60 in order to study the geographical aspects of the places mentioned in the Qur’an. He was also invited to serve on the Advisory Committee which prepared the scheme for the establishment of the Islamic University of Madinah and was on its Academic Council ever since the inception of the University in 1962.

He was also a member of the Foundation Committee of the Rabitah al-Alam al-Islami, Makkah, and of the Academy of Research on Islamic Law, Madinah. In short, he was a tower of inspiration for Muslims the world over and influenced the climate and pattern of thought of Muslims, as the Himalayas or the Alps influence the climate in Asia or Europe without themselves moving about.

His Last Days:

In April 1979, Maududi’s long-time kidney ailment worsened and by then he also had heart problems. He went to the United States for treatment and was hospitalised in Buffalo, New York, where his second son worked as a physician. Even at Buffalo, his time was intellectually productive. He spent many hours reviewing Western works on the life of the Prophet and meeting with Muslim leaders, their followers and well-wishers.

Following a few surgical operations, he died on September 22, 1979 at the age of 76. His funeral was held in Buffalo, but he was buried in an unmarked grave at his residence (Ichra) in Lahore after a very large funeral procession through the city.

May Allah bless him with His mercy for his efforts and reward him amply for the good that he has rendered for the nation of Islam (Ummah).

The Islamic Social Order

2005-10-17T19:32:00.000-07:00

Here’s another article by Maududi on the Islamic Social Order. He is one of the contemporary Islamic Scholars that have written much upon this subject as he was an individual who lived the life of a Revolutionary. I might put up a post about him too.

The Islamic Social Order
Maulana Sayyed Abul ‘Ala Maududi

The foundations of the social system of Islamic rest on the belief that all human beings are equal and constitute one single fraternity.

This is a new and revised translation of a talk given by the author on Radio Pakistan, Lahore, on 10th February, 1948.

Equality of Mankind

Allah created a human couple to herald the beginning of the life of mankind on earth, and everybody living in the world today originates from this couple. The progeny of this couple were initially a single group with one religion and the same language. But as their numbers gradually increased, they spread all over the earth and, as a natural result of their diversification and growth, were divided into various tribes and nationalities. They came to speak different languages; their models of dress varied; and their ways of living also differed widely. climates and environments affected their color and physical features. All these differences exist in the world of reality and Islam does not seek to ignore them. But it disapproves of the prejudices which have arisen among mankind because of these differences in race, color, language and nationality. Islam makes clear to all men that they have come from the same parents and are therefore brothers and equal as human beings. Allah created a human couple to herald the beginning of the life of mankind on earth, and everybody living in the world today originates from this couple. The progeny of this couple were initially a single group with one religion and the same language. But as their numbers gradually increased, they spread all over the earth and, as a natural result of their diversification and growth, were divided into various tribes and nationalities. They came to speak different languages; their models of dress varied; and their ways of living also differed widely. climates and environments affected their color and physical features. All these differences exist in the world of reality and Islam does not seek to ignore them. But it disapproves of the prejudices which have arisen among mankind because of these differences in race, color, language and nationality. Islam makes clear to all men that they have come from the same parents and are therefore brothers and equal as human beings. Allah created a human couple to herald the beginning of the life of mankind on earth, and everybody living in the world today originates from this couple. The progeny of this couple were initially a single group with one religion and the same language. But as their numbers gradually increased, they spread all over the earth and, as a natural result of their diversification and growth, were divided into various tribes and nationalities. They came to speak different languages; their models of dress varied; and their ways of living also differed widely. climates and environments affected their color and physical features. All these differences exist in the world of reality and Islam does not seek to ignore them. But it disapproves of the prejudices which have arisen among mankind because of these differences in race, color, language and nationality. Islam makes clear to all men that they have come from the same parents and are therefore brothers and equal as human beings.

Islam says that if there is any real difference between man and man it cannot be one of race, color, country or language, but of ideas, beliefs and principles. Two children of the same mother, though they may be equal from the point of view of a common ancestry, will have to go their different ways in life if their beliefs and moral conduct differ. On the contrary, two people, one in the East and the other in the West, even though geographically and outwardly separated by vast distances, will tread the same path in life if they share the same code of moral behavior. On the basis of this fundamental tenet, Islam seeks to build a principled and ideological society very different from the racial, nationalistic and parochial societies existing in the world today.

The basis of co-operative effort among men in such a society is not the place of one’s birth but a creed and a moral principle. Anyone, if he believes in Allah as his Master and Lord and accepts the guidance of the Prophets as the law of his life, can join this community, whether he is a resident of America or Africa, whether he belongs to the Semitic race or the Aryan, whether he is black or fair-skinned, whether he speaks a European language or Arabic. All those who join this community will have the same rights and social status. They will not be subjected to any racial, national or class distinctions. No one will be regarded as high or low. There will be no untouchability. There will be no special restrictions upon them in making marriages, eating and drinking and social contracts. No one will be looked down upon because of his birth or work. No one will claim any distinctive rights by virtue of his caste, community or ancestry. Man’s merit will not depend on his family connections or riches, but only on whether he is better than others in moral conduct or excels others in piety and righteousness.

Such social order, transcending as it does geographical boundaries and the barriers of race, color and language, is appropriate for all parts of the world; on its foundations can be raised the universal brotherhood of man. In societies based on race or nationality only those people can join who belong to a particular race or nation, but in Islam anyone who accepts its creed and moral standards can become a member, possessing equal rights with everyone else. Those who do not accept this creed, while obviously not being received into the community, are treated with tolerance and humanity and guaranteed all the basic human rights.

It is clear that if two children of the same mother differ in their ideas, their ways of life will be different; but this does not mean that they cease to be brothers. In the same way, if two nations or two groups of people living in the same country differ in their fundamental beliefs, principles and ideology, their societies will also certainly differ; yet they will continue to share the common ties of humanity. Hence, the Islamic society offers to non-Muslims societies and groups the maximum social and cultural rights that can possibly be accorded.

Institution of the Family

The foremost and fundamental institution of human society is the family unit. A family is established by the coming together of a man and a woman, and their contact brings into existence a new generation. This then produces ties of kinship and community, which, in turn, gradually develop further ties. The family is an instrument of continuity which prepares the succeeding generation to serve human civilization and to discharge its social obligations with devotion, sincerity and enthusiasm. This institution does not merely recruit cadets for the maintenance of human culture, but positively desires that those who are to come will be better members of society. In this respect the family can be truly called the source of the progress, development, prosperity and strength of human civilization. Islam therefore devotes much attention to the issues relating to the family and strives to establish it on the healthiest and strongest possible foundations.

According to Islam the correct relationship between man and woman is marriage, a relationship in which social responsibilities are fully accepted and which results in the emergence of a family. Sexual permissiveness and other similar types of irresponsible behavior are not dismissed by Islam as mere innocent pastimes or ordinary transgressions. Rather, they are acts which strike at the very roots of society. hence, Islam holds all extra-marital sex as sinful and forbidden (haram) and makes it a criminal offence. Severe punishments are prescribed to deter would-be offenders.

Veil, which regulates the free association of men and women, restriction on erotic music and obscene pictures and the discouragement of the spread of all forms of pornography, are other weapons used in the fight to protect and strengthen the institution of the family.

Islam does not look on adult celibacy simply with disfavor, it calls on every young man to take upon himself the social responsibilities of married life just as his parents did in their time. Nor does Islam regard asceticism and lifelong celibacy merely as being of no benefit; it sees them as departures from the nature of man and as acts of revolt against the Divine scheme of things.

It also strongly disapproves of those rites, ceremonies or restrictions which tend to make marriage a difficult affair. Islam tries to make marriage the easiest and fornication the most difficult thing in society, and not vice versa as it is in most societies today. Hence, after debarring certain blood relatives from entering into matrimony with one another, it has legalized marriage with all other near and distant kith and kin. It has removed all distinctions of caste and community, and permitted matrimony of any Muslim with any other Muslim. It has urged that the mehr (dower) should be fixed at a figure which can be easily borne by both sides. it has dispensed with the necessity of priests and register offices. In an Islamic society marriage is a plain and simple ceremony which can be performed anywhere before two witnesses, though it is essential that the proceedings should not be kept secret. Society must know that the couple are now going to live as husband and wife.

Within the family itself Islam has assigned to the man a position of authority so that he can maintain order and discipline as the head of the household. Islam expects the wife to obey her husband and look after his well-being; and it expects the children to behave accordingly to their parents. Islam does not favor a loose and disjointed family system devoid of proper authority, control and discipline. Discipline can only be maintained through a central authority and, in the view of Islam, the position of father in the family is such that it makes him the fittest person to have this responsibility.

But this does not mean that man has been made a house-hold tyrant and woman has been handed over to him as a helpless chattel. According to Islam the real spirit of material life is love, understanding and mutual respect. If woman has been asked to obey her husband, the latter has been called on make the welfare of his family his top priority.

Although Islam places great emphasis on the marital bond, it only wants it to remain intact as long as it is founded on the sweetness of love or there exists at least the possibility of lasting companionship. If neither of these two conditions obtain, it gives man the right of divorce and woman the right of separation; and under certain conditions, where married life has become a source of misery, the Islamic courts of justice have the authority to annul the marriage.

Relatives and NeighborsRelatives and Neighbors

After the limited circle of the family, the next social sphere is that of kinship and blood relationship. Islam wants all those who are related through common parents, common brothers and sisters or marriage to be affectionate, cooperative and helpful to each other. In many places in the Qur’an good treatment of the near relations (Dhawi-al-qurba) is enjoined. In the Hadith of the Prophet, blessings and peace be on him, proper treatment of one’s blood relations has been strongly emphasized and counted among the highest virtues. A person who cold-shoulders his relations or treats them indifferently is looked on by Islam with great disfavor.

But this does not mean that it is an Islamic virtue to favor one’s relations. If such support or bias towards one’s relations results in injustice, it is repugnant to Islam, and is condemned as an act of Jahiliyyah (ignorance). Similarly, it is utterly against the principles of Islam for a government official or public servant to support his relations at public expense or to favor his kith and kin in his official decisions: this would actually be a sinful act. Fair treatment of one’s relations, as enjoined by Islam, should be at one’s own expense and within the limits of justice and fair-play.

After relations come one’s neighbors. The Qur’an has divided them into three categories: a neighbor who is also a relation; a neighbor who is a stranger; and a casual or temporary neighbor with whom one happens to live or travel for a certain time. All of them are deserving of sympathy, affection, kindness and fair treatment. The Prophet, blessings and peace be on him, once said that the right of the neighbor were so strongly emphasized by the angel Gabriel that he thought neighbors might even share one’s inheritance. (Bukhari and Muslim)

In one Hadith the Prophet, blessings and peace be on him, said: Anyone whose neighbor is not safe from his misdeeds is not a true Believer. (Bukhari and Muslim) Again, he said: A person who enjoys a meal while his neighbor is starving is not a true Believer. (Ahmad, Baihaqi). The Prophet, blessings and peace be on him, was once asked about the fate of a woman who performed many Prayers and fasted extensively and who was a frequent almsgiver, but whose neighbors complained of her abusive tongue. He said: Such a woman shall be in the Hell-fire. He was, then, asked about another woman who did not possess these virtues but did not trouble her neighbors either, and he said: She would be in Paradise. (Ahmad, Baihaqi) The Prophet, blessings and peace be on him, has laid so much emphasis on being considerate to neighbors that he has advised that whenever a Muslim brings home fruit for his children he should either send some to his neighbors as a gift, or at least take care not to offend them by throwing the peelings away outside their door. On another occasion he said: A man is really good if his neighbors regard him as such, and bad if they consider him so. (Ibn Majah)

Islam, therefore, requires all neighbors to be loving and helpful and to share each other’s sorrows and happiness. It enjoins them to establish social relations in which one can depend upon the other and regard his life, honor and property safe among his neighbors. A society in which two people, separated only by a wall, remain unacquainted with one another for years, and in which those living in the same area of a town have no interest or trust in one another, can never be called Islamic.

Next to these come the wider relationships covering the whole of society. The broad principles on which Islam wants people to structure their social lives are:

To co-operate in acts of goodness and righteousness and not to co-operate in acts of sin and injustice. (al-Maidah 5: 2)
One’s friendship should be only for seeking the pleasure of Allah: whatever you give should be given because Allah likes it to be given, and whatever you withhold should be withheld because Allah wishes to. (Trimidhi)
You are the best community ever raised among mankind; your duty is to command people to do good and prevent them from committing evil. (Al- ‘Imran 3: 110)
Do not think evil of each other, nor probe into each other’s affairs, nor incite one against the other. Avoid hatred and jealousy. Do not unnecessarily oppose each other. Always remain the slaves of Allah, and live as brothers to each other. (Muslim)
Do not help a tyrant, knowing him to be such. (Abu Daud)
To support the community when it is in the wrong is like falling into a well while catching the tail of your camel which was about to fall into it. (Abu Daud; Mishkawt)
No one among you shall be a true believer unless he likes for others what he likes for himself. (Bukhari and Muslim)

The Islamic Concept of Life

2005-10-17T19:18:00.000-07:00

I'm going to post a few articles in relation with Islam and Sociology. Later, I'll inject my own thoughts either in the articles themselves or just mixed thoughts on Islam & Sociology. This article is a good read:

The Islamic Concept of Life

by Maulana Sayyed Abul 'Ala Maududi

The chief characteristic of Islam is that it makes no distinction between the spiritual and the secular in life. Its aim is to shape both individual lives as well as society as a whole in ways that will ensure that the Kingdom of Allah may really be established on earth and that peace, contentment and well-being may fill the world. The Islamic way of life is thus based on a unique concept of man’s place in the universe. That is why it is necessary that, before we discuss the moral, social, political and economic systems of Islam, we should have a clear idea of what that concept is.

Basic Principles

1. Allah, who is the Creator, the Ruler and the Lord of the universe, has created man and provided him with a temporary home in that part of His vast kingdom which is the earth. He has endowed man with the faculties of thinking and understanding, and has given him the power to distinguish right from wrong. Man has also been invested with free will and the power to use the resources of the world however he likes. That is, man has a measure of autonomy, while being at the same time Allah’s representative on earth.

2. Before assigning to man this vicegerency (Khilafat), Allah made it clear to him that He alone as the Lord, the Ruler and the Deity. As such, the entire universe and all the creatures in it (including man) should submit to Him alone. Man must not think himself totally free and must realise that this earth is not his permanent abode. He has been created to live on it only for a probationary period and, in due course, he will return to his Lord, to be judged according to the way he has spent that period. The only right course for man is to acknowledge Allah as the only Lord, the Sustainer and the Deity, and to follow His guidance and His commands in all he does. His sole objective should be to merit the approval of Allah.

If man follows a course of righteousness and godliness (which he is free to choose and follow) he will be rewarded in this world and the next: in this world he will live a life of peace and contentment, and in the Hereafter he will qualify for the heaven of eternal bliss, al-Jannah. If he chooses to follow the course of godlessness and evil (which he is equally free to choose and follow), his life will be one of corruption and frustration in this world, and in the life to come he will face the prospect of that abode of pain and misery which is called Hell.

3. After making this position clear, Allah set man on earth and provided the very first human beings (Adam and Eve) with guidance as to how they were to live. Thus man’s life on this earth did not start in utter darkness. >From the beginning a bright torch of light was provided so that humanity could fulfill its glorious destiny. The very first man received revealed knowledge from Allah Himself, and was told the correct way to live. This code of life was Islam, the attitude of complete submission to Allah, the Creator of man and the whole universe. It was this religion which Adam, the first man, passed down to posterity.

But later generations gradually drifted away from the right path. Either they lost the original teachings through negligence or they deliberately adulterated and distorted them. They associated Allah with innumerable human beings, material objects and imaginary gods. Shirk (polytheism) became widespread. They mixed up the teachings of Allah with myths and strange philosophies and thus produced a jumble of religions and cults; and they discarded the God-given principles of personal and social morality, the Shari‘ah.

4. Although man departed from the path of truth, disregarded or distorted the Shari‘ah or even rejected the code of Divine guidance, Allah did not destroy them or force them to take the right course. Forced morality was not in keeping with the autonomy He had given to man. Instead, God appointed certain good people from among the human society itself to guide men to the right path. These men believed in Allah, and lived a life of obedience to Him. He honoured them by His revelations, giving them the knowledge of reality. Known as prophets, blessings and peace be on all of them, they were assigned the task of spreading Allah’s message among men.

5. Many thousands of these prophets were raised throughout the ages, in all lands and in all nations. All of them brought the same message, all of them advocated the same way of life, (din), that is, the way which was revealed to man on the first day of his existence. All of them had the same mission: they called men to Islam ¾ to submit to Allah alone, asked those who accepted the Divine law, and for putting an end to all deviations from the true path. Many people, however, refused to accept their guidance and many of those who did accept it gradually drifted away from their initial commitment.

6. Lastly, Allah raised the Prophet Muhammad, blessings and peace be on him, in Arabia to complete the mission of the earlier prophets. The message of Muhammad, blessings and peace be on him, was for the whole of mankind. He presented anew the teachings of Islam in their pristine form and provided humanity once again with the Divine guidance which had been largely lost. He organised all those who accepted his message into one community (Ummah), charged with living in accordance with the teachings of Islam, with calling humanity to the path of righteousness and with establishing the supremacy of the world of Allah on earth. This guidance is enshrined in the Holy Qur’an.

Man: Its Nature and Character

The Qur’an deals in many passages with man’s relationship to Allah and the concept of life which naturally follows from that relationship. Its message is epitomised in the following verse:

Verily Allah hath bought of the Believers their lives and their properties for the price that theirs shall be the Paradise: so they fight in the way of Allah and slay and are slain. It (i.e. the promise of Paradise) is a covenant which is binding on Him in the Torah and the Injil and the Qur’an. And who is more faithful unto his covenant than Allah? Rejoice then in your bargain that ye have made, for that is the supreme triumph. (al-Tawbah 9: 111)

In the above verse the nature of the relationship which comes into existence between man and Allah because of Man (the belief, trust and faith in Allah) is called a ‘bargain’. This means that Man in Allah is not a mere metaphysical concept; it is in the nature of a contract by which man barters his life and his possessions in exchange for the promise of Paradise in the Hereafter. God as it were, purchases a Believer’s life and property and promises, in return, the reward of Paradise in the life after death. This concept of a bargain and a covenant has important implications, and needs to be clearly understood.

Everything in this world belongs to Allah. As such, man’s life and wealth, which are part of this world, also belong to Him, because He has created them and has entrusted them to every man for his use. Looked at from this angle, the question of ‘selling’ or ‘buying’ may not seem to arise at all; Allah does not need to buy what is already His and man cannot sell what is not really his.

But there is one thing which has been conferred on man, and which now belongs fully to him, and that is free will which gives him freedom to choose between following or not following the path of Allah. This freedom of will and choice does not automatically make man the real owner of all the power and resources over which he has command, nor does it give him the right to use them just as he likes. Yet, because of this free will, he may, if he likes, consider himself free of all obligations to the Lord and independent of any higher authority. It is here that the question of bargain arises.

This bargain thus does not mean that Allah is purchasing something which belongs to man. Its real nature is this: all creation belongs to Allah but He bestowed certain things on man to be used by him on trust. Allah wants man to willingly and voluntarily acknowledge this. A person who voluntarily renounces his freedom to reject Allah’s supremacy and instead acknowledges His sovereignty, and, in so doing, ‘sells’ his ‘autonomy’ (which, too, is a gift from Allah) to Allah, will get in return Allah’s promise of eternal bliss in Paradise. A person who makes such a bargain is a Mu’min (Believer) and Man (faith) is the Islamic name for this contract; a person who chooses not to enter into this contract, or who, after making such a contract, does not keep to it, is a Kafir. The avoidance or abrogation of the contract is technically known as Kufr.

Such is the nature of the contract. Now let us briefly study its various aspects and stipulations.

1. Allah has set us to account for ourselves in two areas:

(a) He has left man free, but nonetheless wishes to see whether he will remain honest and loyal to Him, or whether he will rebel against his own Creator, whether he will behave nobly or start ‘playing such fantastic tricks as make the angels weep’.

(b) He wants to see whether man is prepared to have enough trust in Allah to offer his life and wealth in return for a promise about the next world.

2. It is a principle of Islamic law that Man consists in adherence to a certain set of doctrines and anyone who accepts those doctrines becomes a Mu’min. No one has the right to call such a man a disbeliever or drive him from the fold of Ummah, unless there is clear proof that faith has been abandoned. This is the legal position. But in the eyes of the Lord, Man is only valid when it entails complete surrender of one’s will and freedom of choice to the will of Allah. It is a state of thought and action, coming from the heart, wherein man submits himself fully to Allah, renouncing all claim to his own supremacy.

A man may recite the Kalimah, accept the contract and even offer Prayers and perform other acts of worship, but if in his heart he regards himself as the owner and the master of his physical and mental powers and of his moral and material resources, then, however much the people may look upon him as a Mu’min, in the eyes of Allah he will be a disbeliever. He will not really have entered into the bargain which the Qur’an says is the essence of Man. If a man does not use his powers and resources in the way Allah has prescribed for him, using them instead in pursuits which Allah has forbidden, it is clear that either he has not pledged his life and property to Allah, or has nullified that pledge by his conduct.

3. This aspect of Man makes the Islamic way of life the very opposite of that of the non-Muslim. A Muslim, who has real faith in Allah, makes his entire life one of obedience and surrender to His will. He never behaves arrogantly or selfishly or as if he were master of his own destiny, save in moments of forgetfulness. And as soon as he becomes conscious of such a lapse, he will submit himself to his Lord and ask forgiveness for his error.

Similarly, a group of people or a society which consists of true Muslims can never break away from the Law of their Lord. Its political order, its social organisations, its culture, its economic policy, its legal system and its international strategy must all be in tune with the code of guidance revealed by Allah. Any unwitting contraventions must be corrected as soon as they are realised.

It is disbelievers who feel free from Allah’s guidance and behave as if they were their own master. Anyone who behaves like this, even though he may bear a name similar to that of a Muslim, is treading the path of the disbelievers.

4. The will of Allah, which it is obligatory for man to follow, is the one which Allah Himself has revealed for man’s guidance. It cannot be determined by man himself. Allah has Himself explained it clearly and there is no ambiguity about it. Therefore, if a society sticks honestly to its contract with Allah, it must shape its life in accordance with the Book of Allah and the Sunnah of the Prophet, blessings and peace be on him.

It is clear from the foregoing discussion why the payment of the ‘price’ has been postponed till the life after death. Paradise is not the reward for the mere profession of the bargain, it is the reward for the faithful execution of it. Unless the behaviour of the ‘vendor’ complies with the terms of the contract he will not be entitled to the reward. The final act of the ‘sale’ can only be concluded after the last moment of the vendor’s earthly life.

There is another significant point which emerges from the study of the verse quoted above when it is read in its context in the Qur’an. In the verses preceding it, reference is made to the people who professed Iman and promised a life of obedience, but who, when the hour of trial came, proved unequal to the task. Some neglected the call of the hour and betrayed the cause. Others refused to sacrifice their lives and riches in the cause of Allah. The Qur’an, after criticising their insincerity, makes it clear that Man is a contract, a form of pledge between man and Allah. It does not consist in a mere profession of belief in Allah. It is an acknowledgment of the fact that Allah alone is our Lord, Sovereign and Ruler and that everything that man has, including his own life, belongs to Him and must be used in accordance with His directives. If a Muslim adopts a different course, he is insincere in his profession of faith. Only those who have really sold their lives and all that they possess to Allah and who follow His dictates in all spheres of activity can be called true Believers.

The Scheme of Life

In Islam, man’s entire individual and social life is an exercise in developing and strengthening his relationship with Allah. Man, the starting point of our religion, consists in the acceptance of this relationship by man’s intellect and will; Islam means submission to the will of Allah in all aspects of life. The Islamic code of conduct is known as the Shari‘ah. Its sources are the Qur’an and the Sunnah of the Prophet, blessings and peace be on him.

The final Book of Allah and His final Messenger stand today as the repositories of this truth. Everyone who agrees that the concept of Reality stated by the Prophet, and the Holy Book is true, should step forward and surrender himself to the will of Allah. It is this submission which is called Islam, the result of Man in actual life. And those who of their own freewill accept Allah as their Sovereign, surrender to His Divine will and undertake to regulate their lives in accordance with His commandments, are called Muslims.

All those persons who thus surrender themselves are welded into a community and that is how the ‘Muslim society’ comes into being. It is an ideological society, radically different from those which are founded on the basis of race, colour or territory. It is the result of a deliberate choice, the outcome of a ‘contract’ which takes place between human beings and their Creator. Those who enter into this contract undertake to recognise Allah as their Sovereign, His guidance as supreme and His injunctions as absolute Law. They also undertake to accept, without question, His word as to what is good or evil, right or wrong, permissible or prohibited. In short, freedoms of the Islamic society are limited by the commandments of the Omniscient Allah. In other words, it is Allah and not man whose will is the primary source of Law in a Muslim society.

When such a society comes into existence, the Book and the Messenger prescribe for it a code of life called the Shari‘ah and this society is bound to conform to it by virtue of the contract is has entered into. It is, therefore, inconceivable that a real Muslim society can deliberately adopt any other system of life than that based on the Shari‘ah. If it does so, its contract is ipso facto broken and it becomes ‘un-Islamic’.

But we must clearly distinguish between the everyday sins of the individual and a deliberate revolt against the Shari‘ah. The former may not mean a breaking up of the contract, while the latter most certainly would. The point that should be clearly understood is that if an Islamic society consciously resolves not to accept the Shari‘ah, and decides to enact its own constitution and laws or borrows them from any other source in disregard of the Shari‘ah, such a society breaks its contract with Allah and forfeits its right to be called ‘Islamic’..

Objectives and Characteristics

The main objectives of the Shari‘ah are to ensure that human life is based on ma’rufat (good) and to cleanse it of munkarat (evils). The term ma’rufat denotes all the qualities that have always been accepted as ‘good’ by the human conscience. Conversely, the world munkarat denotes all those qualities that have always been condemned by human nature as ‘evil’. In short, the ma’rufat are in harmony with human nature and the munkarat are against nature. The Shari‘ah gives precise definitions of ma’rufat and munkarat, clearly indicating the standards of goodness for which individuals and society should aspire.

It does not, however, limit itself to an inventory of good and evil deeds; rather, it lays down an entire scheme of life whose aim is to make sure that good flourishes and evils do not destroy or harm human life.

To achieve this, the Shari‘ah has embraced in its scheme everything that encourages the growth of good and has recommended ways to remove obstacles that might prevent this growth. This process gives rise to a subsidiary series of ma’rufat consisting of ways of initiating and nurturing the good, and yet another set of ma’rufat consisting of prohibitions in relation to those things which act as impediments to good. Similarly, there is a subsidiary list of munkarat which might initiate or allow the growth of evil.

The Shari‘ah shapes Islamic society in a way conducive to the unfettered growth of good, righteousness and truth in every sphere of human activity. At the same time it removes all the impediments along the path of goodness. And it attempts to eradicate corruption from its social scheme by prohibiting evil, by removing the causes of its appearance and growth, by closing the inlets through which it creeps into a society and by adopting deterrent measures to check its occurrence.

Ma’rufat

The Shari‘ah divides ma’rfat into three categories: the mandatory (fard and wajib), the recommendatory (mandub) and the permissible (mubah).

The observance of the mandatory is obligatory on a Muslim society and the Shari‘ah has given clear and binding directions about this. The recommendatory ma’rufat are those which the Shari‘ah expects a Muslim society to observe and practise. Some of them have been very clearly demanded of us while others have been recommended by implication and inference from the sayings of the Prophet, blessings and peace be on him. Besides this, special arrangements have been made for the growth and encouragement of some of them in the scheme of life advocated by the Shari‘ah. Others again have simply been recommended by the Shari‘ah, leaving it to the society or to its more virtuous elements to look to promote them.

This leaves us with the permissible ma’rufat. Strictly speaking, according to the Shari‘ah everything which has not been expressly prohibited is a permissible ma’ruf. Consequently, the sphere of permissible ma’rufat is very wide, so much so that except for the things specifically prohibited by the Shari‘ah everything is permissible for a Muslim. And in this vast sphere we have been given freedom to legislate according to our own discretion to suit the requirements of our "time and its dictates."

Munkarat

The munkarat (the things prohibited in Islam) have been grouped into two categories: things which have been prohibited absolutely (haram), and things which are simply undesirable (makruh).

Muslims have been enjoined by clear and mandatory injunctions to refrain totally from everything that has been declared haram. As for the makruh, the Shari‘ah signifies its disapproval either expressly or by implication, giving an indication also as to the extent of such disapproval. For example, there are some makruh things bordering on haram, while others are closer to acts which are permissible. Moreover, in some cases, explicit measures have been prescribed by the Shari‘ah for the prevention of makruh things, while in others such measures have been left to the discretion of the society or individual.

Some Other Characteristics

The Shari‘ah thus prescribes directives for the regulation of our individual as well as collective lives. These directives affect such varied subjects as religious rituals, personal character, morals, habits, family relationships, social and economic affairs, administration, the rights and duties of citizens, the judicial system, the laws of war and peace and international relations. They tell us what is good and bad; what is beneficial and useful and what is injurious and harmful; what are the virtues which we have to cultivate and encourage and what are the evils which we have to suppress and guard against; what is the sphere of our voluntary, personal and social action and what are its limits; and, finally, what methods we can adopt to establish a dynamic order of society and what methods we should avoid. The Shari‘ah is a complete way of life and an all-embracing social order.

Another remarkable feature of the Shari‘ah is that it is an organic whole. The entire way of life propounded by Islam is animated by the same spirit and hence any arbitrary division of the scheme is bound to affect the spirit as well as the structure of the Islamic order. In this respect, it might be compared to the human body. A leg separated from the body cannot be called one-eighth or one-sixth man, because after its separation from the body the leg cannot perform its function. Nor can it be placed in the body of some other animal with the aim of making it human to the extent of that limb. Likewise, we cannot form a correct judgment about the utility, efficiency and beauty of the hand, the eye or the nose of a human being outside the context of their place and function within the living body.

The same can be said about the scheme of life envisaged by the Shari‘ah. Islam signifies a complete way of life which cannot be split up into separate parts. Consequently, it is neither appropriate to consider the different parts of the Shari‘ah in isolation, nor to take any particular part and bracket it with any other ‘ism’. The Shari‘ah can function smoothly only if one’s whole life is lived in accordance with it.

Next 10-15 on Sociology

2005-09-19T17:04:00.000-07:00

I'm going to dedicate the next 10-15 posts on Sociology for my Introduction to Sociology class that I'm taking at College. It will consist of my thoughts and reactions in regards to different subjects within Sociology. I think everyone will find this very interesting.

Take Care,
Samir

Intellectual discussion & article on US banning alcohol

2005-09-11T22:30:00.000-07:00

Assalam Alaikum,

I decided to continue this blog because people are actually reading it to my surprise. So, once in a while, I will throw out my thoughts, and most of the time, I will put some [intelligent] articles here. My more active blog is my xanga: www.xanga.com/inshALLAHshaheed

The US cannot ban alcohol without purifying the nation
by Samir Khan

The US tried banning alcohol in its own Country a while ago. It was a million dollar project. The people rebelled, which resulted in violence, and the increase in alcohol consumption. Why did the US fail in their ban of alcohol when Muhammad succeeded in banning alcohol?

1. The Sahabas were spiritually and mentally prepared. When the ban on alcohol commenced, they didn't need to use any money to enforce the law because the people were willing to accept it. Before its commencement, the Sahabas drank alcohol; it wasn't forbidden until later after the hijrah.

2. Aisha (ra) said that if the first verse of the Qur’an were to be on the ban of alcohol, the people would have rejected it. If the first verse of the Qur’an were to be on the ban of zina, the people would have rejected it. Why? Because they were not spiritual molded into obedient slaves of the Creator at the very beginning. The first ayaat were from Surah al-‘Alaq which advised man on the Glory-ness of Allah and to appreciate His status; this opened the eyes of those who accepted. If the first ayaat were on the prohibition of a certain act, there would have been a different response in society.

3. When the ayah on the banning of alcohol arrived, the word spread and the Sahaba threw away their alcohol, spat it out, and even forced themselves to vomit all the alcohol out. The streets of Medina were flowing of alcohol that day.

4. The Sahaba didn’t need a police force to stop the consumption of alcohol, unlike the US. The Sahaba were ready to face any law which might be seen as a hardship in the eyes of those who were not as prepared as the Sahaba.

5. The first thing the Sahaba were taught was not the ban of alcohol or the commands of the Qur’an, but they were taught about the reality of this life as well as paradise and hellfire. This would instill into their hearts the accurate way to view this life; they lived, and preached these truths. So when the ban of alcohol came, it was trouble-free to apply.

6. The outlawing of alcohol came gradually. There were minor bans such as the command to not pray salah while intoxicated. Note that this was not an absolute ban on alcohol. This is one of the realistic methods of achievable morality which led to their implementation of the law to not drink alcohol.

So what does the US have to do in order to ban alcohol?

1. The US has to instill into the minds and hearts of the Americans the purpose of life, paradise, and hellfire. All effective means should be exhausted in order to emphasize the ideology whether it is through media, magazines, books, libraries, movies, public rallies for a moral society, internet, videogames, other laws, and so on.

2. Since we are not at the level to challenge the US on alcohol, the Islamic movements today should work tirelessly in purifying the people of this nation. That is, giving the nation the paramount way of thinking and viewing the life of this world. They should exhaust all the means of propagating this message as well as living this message. This is part of the bottom-up approach to establishing the Kingdom of Allah on earth. There is a good chance that this might lead to the polarization of society where for example: one will be embarrassed to drink alcohol in public.

3. The members of the various Islamic movements have to be Sahaba-like. This is not an option otherwise this propagation will be useless as the society will question the groups claim to understanding salvation and practicing its pre-requisites. Islamic movements cannot be battling the dominant culture whilst simultaneously accepting it; a counter-culture is not a subculture.

4. After the US government recognizes what the Islamic movement’s methods and motives are, the government should support them. The least they can do is provide financial assistance.

5. There were no incentives for the Americans in forbidding themselves from drinking alcohol. When there is no concept of ultimate reward and ultimate punishment, then the people will do as they wish and chaos will be prevalent in the land. This is why a lot of Americans ridicule those Countries that have lesser freedoms. The issue is not about having the most freedom, but the main concern is about controlling society from going out of control. So the American government has to produce an incentive for the public in order to come to reason with the souls of the inhabitants. The underlying motivational factor for the Sahaba was belief in Paradise and Hellfire. They worried that if they sinned, there would then be a chance that the punishment of Allah would be upon them. At the same time, they knew that if they kept up their righteous acts, there would be a chance that they would be rewarded with the eternal prize. They lived a life where they accepted a trade with Allah in that if they sold themselves for His sake wholly and solely, then He would grant them Paradise in return (9:111). This is what made the Sahaba’s known as Sahaba’s.

The destiny of Israel

2005-01-19T09:35:00.000-08:00

The following article is written by a Journalist I know of and enjoy reading. In this article, he surrounds his arguments around Shaykh Imran N. Hosein's book, "Jerusalem in the Qur'an"... This article is REALLY good:

The destiny of Israel
Abid Ullah Jan
http://www.icssa.org/Review_Jerusalrm.htm

We must realize that something horrible is in store for the world in which starving half a million children to death is a valid price but calling Israel an illegitimate and racist state has become the most serious crime.

Many would agree with the statement that it is highly unlikely that the Israeli oppression and unaccountability can continue for another 50 years before it faces the horrible consequences. But many would be surprised to know that it is matter of a few more years before Israel overtakes the US as a Ruling State, just as the US replaced England as a Ruling State at the end of World War 1.

Those of us who find this observation strange may not realize that we are passing through very strange times. Indications of the coming times are right before our eyes, for example in finding one set of people not allowed to simply cover their head for it undermines secular values. Whereas another people are free to occupy land, subjugate native people, indiscriminately kill and expel those who do not share the same race, and engage in ethnic cleansing on the grounds of their distorted scriptures.

Another indication is helplessness of the whole world before the Israeli aggression, defiance, WMD and state terrorism. The question arises: Why has Israel been granted this special status and special support despite the world looking at its undeniable crimes with wide open eyes? Why other countries are punished with decades of genocidal sanctions, wars and occupations for far minor crimes than the Israeli government?

One can find answer to these and many similar questions in Jerusalem in the Qur’an by Imran N. Hosein. It is an amazing book, explaining not only the destiny of Jerusalem but also of Jews and Muslims and the rest of the world in an extremely broad perspective. We fail to find answers to such questions because we are lost in the distorted realities that revolve around ongoing events alone.

Jerusalem in the Qur’an shows us the future in a broader historical, religious perspective. The author proves his bold conclusions, such as that the Israel is close to replacing the US as a Ruling State, in a mathematical way. The book also brings forward many hidden aspects of the Qur’an that answers questions lurking in the minds of many Americans who truly love their country and many Muslims who are looking but at just part of the Divine knowledge.
Extracting argument from the Qur’an and sayings of Prophet Muhammad (PBUH), the author proves that it is just a matter of time before the US taste the fruits of the American-Israeli obsession with the Holy Land. It is exactly same way in which England at its peak was strangely obsessed with the Holy Land. “The British people were themselves incapable of explaining this strange obsession,” argues the author.

Jerusalem in the Qur’an explains the roots and consequences of this strange Euro-American obsession with the Holy Land. Using references from the Qur’an about behavior of the Jews, destiny of Jerusalem, and related prophesies, the author clearly shows how Israel — armed with enough WMD and supported by Euro-Jewish financiers and bankers — has it within its power to assume financial control of the world through the simple maneuver of causing the collapse of the US dollar. “When the US dollar goes down it would bring down the entire world of paper money with it.

This may be planned to synchronize with a spectacular Euro-Israeli display of military power in an attack on the Palestinians as well as neighboring Arab States.” The author goes on: “Israel will then successfully defy the rest of the world in holding on to the fruits of its war and, in so doing, establish itself as the ruling power in the world. When that occurs it would most certainly appear to the Israeli-Jews (i.e., Banū Isrāīl) that they would be experiencing the return of the golden age, i.e., the age when Solomon’s Israel ruled the world.”

Author’s open challenge to all

The story of the rise and fall of Jews and Muslims and the coming events is told in such an interesting and logical manner that one cannot help but sit and finish the whole book in a single go. Interestingly, the book throws an open challenge to both Muslims and non-Muslims. The challenge to Muslims is to “declare either that the Qur’an does not explain the return of the Jews to the Holy Landand the restoration of the State of Israel, or that there is a different explanation other than the one given in this book.”

To non-Muslims the challenge is that if they “declare that they possess the Truth,” they should “use that Truth to explain this subject.” That appears to be the greatest importance of this book. It validates the Islamic claim to Truth! Let us take an example from the book.

According to the author, the strangest, most mysterious and most inexplicable events ever to have occurred in the religious history of mankind is the return of the Jews to the Holy Land to reclaim it as their own some 2000 years after they had been expelled by Allah.

At the very heart of the Qur’anic view in this regard is the declaration that when the final count-down in the Last Age arrives Jews would be gathered from the Diaspora in which they were broken up and dispersed, and to which they had been consigned, and would be brought back to the Holy Land as a ‘mingled crowd’ (Qur’an, 17:104). That Divine promise has already been fulfilled.

But before Banū Israel’s final divine punishment takes place, there is great drama which is yet to unfold in the Holy Land and, indeed, in the world -- such as the establishment of the greater Israel, which the author calls the Ruling State. The Transfer of power from the US, in author’s view, has already begun with the September 11 incident and US invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan.

Furthermore, “Muslims have precise information of the moment in time when Jesus (sallalahu ‘alaihi wa sallam), the Messiah, will return” and when “the Zionist-Jews will finally reach the supreme moment in their over-all strategy to get the Arabs to submit to Jewish rule in the Holy Land . “It will be when the water in the Sea in Galilee has almost dried up, or has dried up…That submission would imply their worship of the False Messiah rather than the worship of Allah Most High. They would be required to submit to Israel in order to get water from the desalinization plants that Israel would build. The Arabs would be too poor to be able to afford to buy water.”

The book gives substantial references from the Qur’an and sayings of the Prophet Muhammad to prove this point along with the scientific reports which show that water in the Sea in Galilee is really drying up faster than expected. Furthermore, the author has made a commendable effort to present in the simple possible language the link between anti-Christ and Riba and between Gog and Magog in the light of Prophet Muhammad’s (PBUH) sayings.

It makes the book a great effort in the sense that it gathered scattered and often disregarded information for focusing on a specific subject with full force. It is highly unlikely that anyone who reads this book would have any doubt about the author’s clarification of some very complex issues such as that of anti-Christ and what is in store for the world.

Zionist’s reality

There is much talk about hidden power of the Zionists but no one has so far explained the historical and religious aspect of their actions and respective implication as Imran N. Hosein has done through an impartial analysis of all relevant religious and historical sources.

Even most of the Muslims have started making concessions to the Israeli claim that it has Biblical claims to the Holy Land. The author argues that the so-called defenders of Israel are the Zionists who “have essentially abandoned the ethical heart of the religion of Abraham (sallalahu ‘alaihi wa sallam).” The author effectively proves that the Zionists amended Torah and declared many permissible as prohibited and vice versa. And finally they have imposed an “impostor Israel” instead of “real Israel”.

The author asks whether the Zionists right to inherit the Holy Land is unconditional. Would it still be valid if they establish a secular state and “their progeny were to abandon the religion of Abraham and the laws of Allah? “”We should note that the God of Abraham (‘alaihi al-Salām) prohibited the borrowing and lending of money on interest (Ribā ). [1] The Jews changed the Torah to legalize the lending of money on interest to those who were not Jews. Not only is Ribā legal in the Holy Land today, but so are also many other things that were prohibited by Allah, Most High.”

Before and after the formation of the State of Israel, Zionists have been engaged in injustice, oppression, tyranny and repression, while Abraham was clearly told that Allah’s covenant of promise will not reach those of Abraham’s offspring who commit acts of Dhulum (i.e., injustice, oppression, tyranny, repression, suppression) — Al-Qur’an, 2:124.

This is exactly how the Zionist-secular state of Israel is established and it continues to display the same behavior. And according to the Qur’an: “And We declared in the Zabur (i.e., the Psalms ) which followed (Our declaration in) the Zikr (i.e., the Torah ) that it is (only) those servants of Mine who are righteous in their conduct who would inherit the (Holy) Land.” (Al-Qur’an, 21:105). The author thus proves that the Qur’an not only reaffirmed ‘righteousness’ as the condition for such inheritance (Sūrah al-Anbiyāh , 21:105), but went on to direct attention to the historical evidence that violation of that condition always resulted in Divine expulsion from the (Holy) Land.

The book gives numerous examples from the Israeli press to show that it is a godless and oppressive system which has nothing to do with the re-establishment of ancient Israel and the law of Abraham. One of the example from the horse’s mouth is an editorial in the Jerusalem Post which has this to say: For too many Israelis, Jewishness has become an archaic, primitive, and irrelevant system that competes for power and funding, and even a source of embarrassment for an intellectually-oriented modern society (Jerusalem Post, September 12, 2000).

Zionist Strategy

The author distinguishes between the key roles of the Israelite or Sephardic Jews (descendents of Prophet Isaac), and the Jews of European origin. It is the Zionists from Europe who distorted scriptures from the Torah and Bible to justify their crimes and to motivate the Jews to establish a State of Israel that extends from the Nile to the Euphrates with Jerusalem as its capital.

According to the author the Zionists exploited “every single lie that was put into the Bible by embellishing those lies with a mountain of more lies.” They worked with the corrupt ruling Arab elites to make their client states recognize Israel and then abandon them at an appropriate time. “This Jewish-Arab (elite) strategy has today reached an advanced stage of implementation. … Indeed the strategy of abandoning that Arab elite has already begun.”

Here the author also proves that well according to the prayers of Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) the strategy did not work out in Syria and Yemen. [2]

The book is actually partly written in response to the Zionists lies promoted by spokespersons, such as Daniel Pipes, who in his July 21, 2000 article in LA Times attempted to dismiss any Islamic claim to Jerusalem by declaring of Jerusalem, among other things, that: “It is not once mentioned in the Qur’ān or in the liturgy”. The way Imran N. Hosein collected different pieces of history and linked them like beads through the message of the Qur’an with respect to Jerusalem is enough to leave Pipes speechless.

The reason Zionists ignore even those portions of the Qur’an which mention that Holy Land was given to Jews (5:24-6; Again it amazes me that Jewish and Zionist scholarship should so studiously have avoided quoting these plain statements in which the Qur’ān declared that the Holy Land was given to the Jews (5:24-6; 17:103-104 and 7:137) is because the Qur’an also “offers an explanation for that strange behavior. The explanation resides in their reluctance to reveal the corruption of the divine conditions in the Torah which Allah Most High had ordained for inheritance of the Holy Land . The fraud in the rewritten Torah is exposed in the Qur’ān.”
So the Zionist dream of liberating the Holy Land from Gentiles and restoring the State of Israel is well on the way to realization. The author predicts that the Temple would be reconstructed for the Jewish worship. Even as we are writing this review, the news arrived that a Zionist in the US has donated $10 million and Israeli government is on the way to dig another tunnel under Masjid al-Aqsa — a step in the direction of fulfilling the long awaited dream to demolishing the Masjid and reconstructing the Temple (Masjid) of Solomon (alaihi al-Salām).
Since the Zionists will achieve all these apparent successes in the most inhuman manner, the author digs out references from the Qur’an that after expelling the rebellious Jews out of the Holy Land for the second time, Allah declared His intention to keep on punishing them “if they kept on desecrating the Holy Land with violations of the condition of faith and righteous conduct. ‘….but if ye revert (to your violation of the condition imposed for inheritance of the Holy Land ) We shall revert (to Our punishments. i.e., you will be expelled again and again)….’ (Qur’ān, Banū Israīl , 17:8).”

Keeping the apartheid and ethnic cleansing based racist policies of the Israeli state in mind, the author concludes that the destiny of “Jerusalem is plainly written in the above warning and firm declaration in the Qur’ān. This remains so regardless of any…agreements negotiated in Camp David…resolution of the US Senate…[or] resolutions of the UN…”

Appearance vs. reality

Another beauty of the book is the author’s skillful separation of appearances from the reality in the light of the Qur’an. It greatly assists readers in understanding the issues in which many Jews disagree. This work is a proof how the complex riddles of present day politics and international relation can never be understood without referring to the Qur’an which clearly states: “Verily the Qur’an explains to the Israelites most of the matters in which they disagree. And it certainly is a Guide and a Mercy to those who believe” (Al-Qur’an, 27:76-7). And Middle East is at the centre of a never ending problem.

Apparently mpst Jews have embraced Israel as the fulfillment of their greatest dream of returning to the Holy Land. It will soon become a Ruling State as no one can challenge it in any way. In the author’s view, “The fact that they have been so utterly and completely deceived by the Impostor State of Israel is indicative of their continuing spiritual blindness.”

The ‘reality’ from the Islamic point of view is that the Antichrist has deceived the Jews into believing that divine grace has brought them this close to the complete fulfillment of their greatest dream. The ‘reality’ is that their spiritual blindness has led them into a divine trap from which there is now no escape.” The much dreaded and oft-repeated ‘destruction of Israel’ is its destiny.

Confirmation of the reality

Another beauty of this book is the seeming repetition at some places. It, in fact, represented the extreme inter-connectedness and inescapable reality of history, scriptures and current affairs. The author hammers the nails of his argument from different directions until he conclusively proves his point of view.

In support of the above mentioned reality, the author brings forward a verse from the Holy Qur’an: “Allah has promised to those among you who believe (in Islām ) and are righteous in conduct that He will surely cause them to inherit the land (i.e., the Holy Land ), as He granted it to those before them (i.e., the Jews); that He will establish their religion (i.e., Islām) in authority (in the Holy Land), the (religion) which He has chosen for them (see Qur’ān, al-Maidah, 5:3); and that He will change (their state) after the fear in which they (lived) to one of security and peace: ‘They will worship Me (alone) and not associate aught with Me.’ If any do reject faith after this they are rebellious and wicked.” (Qur’ān, al-Nūr , 24:55)

For explaining “the state of fear” in the above mentioned verse, the author refers to the “fear in which the believers [Muslims] live" and declares that "it must surely include the present awesome Israeli oppression in the Holy Land .”

Conclusion

In a world in which one cannot afford to call Israel a racist state, where one cannot survive without recognizing its “legitimacy;, where anyone calling for Israel’s destruction is branded as a terrorist who deserves to be thrown into the concentration camp at Guantanamo Bay, presenting an undeniable thesis of its destruction needs a lot of courage.

To convincingly present his thesis, the author proves authenticity of quotes from religious scriptures with references to history and current affairs. At the same time, he effectively explains historical and current events in the light of religious scriptures. He also quotes many verses from the Holy Qur’an and sayings of Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) which many of the co-opting Muslims try to avoid. Such shying away on the part of Muslims leaves many of the Westerners — particularly the Americans who love their country and don’t want to see it bleeding at the cost of propping Israel — ignorant of the Truth and unaware of the hard facts.
The reason Imran N. Hosein could say it all in his book Jerusalem in the Qur’an is simply that he is neither head of a client state nor a hand picked sheikh of Al-Azhar. He is not afraid of losing any title of fake Islamic scholarship. This makes his in depth research into the divine scriptures, history and current affairs a valuable lesson for every human being on the face of earth.

Notes

[1] “Thou shalt not lend on interest to thy brother (Jew); whether it be lending money on interest, or lending commodities on interest (because commodities were sometimes used as money) or lending on interest anything which is lent on interest (i.e., anything which functions as money). Unto a stranger (i.e., one who is not a Jew) you may lend on interest…” (Deuteronomy , 23:19-20)

Their crimes also included: “This is why the wisdom of God said: I will send them Prophets and Messengers. Some they will kill and some they will persecute. It was that the blood of all the Prophets shed from the foundation of the world might be charged upon this generation (of Jews), from the blood of Abel down to the blood of Zakariah , who was slain between the altar and the House of God - yes, I tell you, it will all be charged upon this generation….” (Luke, 11:49-51)

[2] “Narrated by Ibn Umar : The Prophet (sallalahu ‘alaihi wa sallam) said: O Allah! Bestow Your Blessings on our Sham (Syria) and our Yemen . People said: Our Najd (Najd is that part of Saudi Arabia from which the Saudi rulers have originated). The Prophet again said: O Allah! Bestow Your Blessings on our Sham and Yemen. They said again: Our Najd as well. On that the Prophet said: There will appear earthquakes and afflictions, and from there (i.e., Najd) will come out the side of the head of Satan .” (Sahih, Bukhari )

Abid Ullah Jan’s latest book, The End of Democracy, has just been released in Canada.

The Philosophy of a true Islamic Revolution

2005-01-12T21:30:00.000-08:00

Assalam Alaikum Wa Rahmatullahi Wa Barakatuhu,

I hope all is well with you and your family.

My thoughts are now in the process of forcing my fingers to work. Unfortunately, I have to be very brief because I am extremely tired.

What is the Philosophy of most revolutions? I mean like deep down, their root, their motivating cause or source, their ideal?

99% of the time, the answer will be a reward awaiting in the life of this world. For Revolutions, the goal is to achieve domination, and for some, world domination. It is to have more power, more authority, more rights, more money and so on. If it is a group that has a political agenda or economist agenda, that will be their very ideal; to achieve that end.

What makes up the philosophy of a true Islamic Revolution? Is it to acquire more wealth? A higher status? More control?

The answer, interestingly, does not lie within the life of this world; rather, it lies within the life of the next world, the Hereafter. The Philosophy of a true Islamic Revolution would be to attain the ultimate pleasure of Allah (The Most High) by fulfilling the given priorities in their proper order; the ideal is not achieving Paradise or being saved from the Hellfire, rather, the ideal is Allah (The Most High) purely.

What are those priorities?
1. Iman (Spiritual Purification of the heart)
2. Ibadah (Total willingness to submit to the will of Allah [The Most High])
3. Shahadah 'Alan Naas (Bearing witness unto humanity this gift of Islam)
4. Iqamat ud Deen (Establishing this gift given to humanity, Islam)

These priorities, when put into action, completely revolutionize the individual. No longer will the being be distracted by the worldly temptations that Allah (The Most High) tests him or her with.

What happens when you fall for the temptations of this world?

Let's analyze a few examples, starting with alcohol:

1. It is a sweet drink, and is put in many foods.
2. However, the harm is greater than the benefit.
3. How? At least from a purely scientific point of view, alcohol can damage the brain and if one were to take it too far, can make one drunk; and we know what all happens to one who gets drunk.

Adultery or Dating:

1. It is very tempting and feels good when fulfilled.
2. Former Pres. Clinton prophesized that this country will one day have the majority of its children born out of wed-lock; and this is slowly occuring! This is why Bush is saying "Marriage! Marriage! Marriage!"
3. But aside from that, what is wrong with it? It is, in actuality, a very evil way of using someone; there is no guarantee that you will even marry that individual! So let's us say that Sally and Rob are dating. Few months later, they break up. Then Sally gets married to John. John finds out that Sally had an Ex-boyfriend and therefore, she had been used. From the perspective of a man, you would feel weird as hell when marrying a girl that already commited adultery with some dude you don't even know...
4. It can lead to rape; those are the words of your statistics, not me; 'Date Rape'.

There are actually a million examples, but like I said earlier, I am really tired. So I'll end this with a quote from the Qur'an:

And if you could see when the angels take away the souls of those who disbelieve (at death), they smite their faces and their backs, (saying): "Taste the punishment of the blazing Fire!" (8:50)

Indeed Allah (The Most High) Speaks the Truth!

take care,
Samir

Human Liberation - an Islamic Renaissance

Who is Dr. Israr Ahmad?

Who is Sayyid Qutb?

See also

References

External links

Liberal movements within Islam

Reform, not schism

Contemporary and controversial Issues

In North America

Islam and Anarchism.

See also

External links

References

What is Islamic Philosophy?

Introduction

Formative influences

The Classical Period

Later Muslim Philosophy

Modern Muslim philosophy

See also

Sociology of knowledge

Schools

Karl Mannheim

Phenomenological sociology

Michel Foucault

Bruno Latour

The sociology of mathematical knowledge

See also

What is Nihilism?

Etymological origins

Nihilism in philosophy

Nihilism in ethics and morality

Postmodernism and the breakdown of knowledge

Lyotard and meta-narratives

Nihilism and Nietzsche

The nihilist paradox

Nihilism in art

Dada

Nihilism in literature

Nihilism in Music

See also

External links

References

Books on Nihilism

What is Materialism?

Varieties of materialism

History of materialism

References

What is Social Justice?

The conceptual problem

The evolving answer

The modern concept

The basic liberties

Observations

Beliefs

Criticism

Other uses

See also

Sources

Early Muslim sociology

Social responsibility in commerce

Ecological responsibility

Khaldun's conflict theory

Asibiyah

Khaldun's economics

Khaldun's history

Similarity to modern sociology

Alcohol?

NO ALCOHOL, ABSOLUTELY AND POSITIVELY!by: Muhammad Ishaq Zahid Feb 25, 1998 updated: May 27, 98

MEN, ALCOHOL, AND BABIES!

Alcohol Syndrome May Result in Long term Brain Damage!

$85.8 billion, 100,000 deaths and Alcohol

A study by the American Medical Association (1988)

STORMIN' NORMIN ON BEER

ALCOHOL HERE = tinat al-khabal in the HEREAFTER

REFERENCES:

What does a healthy Parent-Child relationship look like?

The Parent-Child Relationship in IslamBy Dr. I.A. Arshed

What is a Civilized Family?

NO ALCOHOL, ABSOLUTELY AND POSITIVELY!
by: Muhammad Ishaq Zahid Feb 25, 1998 updated: May 27, 98

The Parent-Child Relationship in Islam
By Dr. I.A. Arshed

The Civilized Family
by Sayyid Qutb