Chapter:
- A
Path f Mankind
- A
Unique Path
- An
Easy Path
- An
Effective Path
- The
Potential of Human Nature
- The
Resources of Experience
- Traces
and Effects
- Finally
A
PATH FOR MANKIND
There
is a primary and simple fact about the reli-gion
of Islam and the manner of its operation in the
life of mankind which, for all its simplicity,
is fre-quently forgotten or initially
misunderstood. From forgetting or failing to
comprehend it, there arises a serious error in
examining the religion, both its essential
nature and its historic reality, its present and
its future.
Some
expect Islam, seeing that it is revealed by God,
to operate in human life in a magical,
extra-ordinary and incomprehensible manner. They
expect it to operate without any regard for
human nature, for the innate capacities and
material realities of human life, in varying
stages of human development and environments.
However,
they see that it does not operate in this manner,
that limited human abilities and the material
realities of human existence interact with it.
Some-times, these two factors are clearly
influenced by religion; whereas at other periods
their influence is in a direction contrary to that
of the faith: they strengthen the passions and
desires of people, their weaknesses and
shortcomings, thus preventing them from following
the call of the faith and travelling along its
path.
When
they realize this, they encounter an un-expected
disappointment, and their trust In the seriousness
and reality of the religious way of life is
damaged. They may even be afflicted by doubt con-cerning
religion as such.
Hence
a whole series errors arises from of a single,
fundamental error: misunderstanding this faith of
Islam and its path, or neglect of this primary,
simple truth.
The
faith of Islam is a divinely-ordained path for
human life. Its realization in the life of mankind
depends on the exertions of men themselves, within
the limits of their human capacities and the
material realities of human existence in a given
environment. Working for this aim starts at the
point where man-kind finds itself on being given
the necessary equip-ment, and it continues to the
end of the path within the bounds of human
capacities, insofar as these are put to work.
A
basic characteristic of Islam is this: that it
never forgets for an instant, at any time or
place, the nature of man and the limits of his
capacities, nor does it neglect the material
realities of his existence, Yet, at the same time,
it causes him to attain - as has happened at
various periods in the past and can always happen,
if the necessary efforts are made - a higher point
than that reached by any man-made sys-tem
whatsoever. This is accomplished with ease,
comfort, security and moderation.
All
error arises from misunderstanding or ne-glecting
the nature of this faith, from expecting the
occurrence of miracles of hidden origin, miracles
which will transform the nature of man, pay no
atten-tion to his limited capacities, and have no
regard for the material realities of his
environment.
Is
Islam not revealed by God? And is not God
omnipotent? Why, then, does this faith operate
only within the boundaries of restricted human
abilities? Why should the results of its operation
be affected by human weakness? Why is it not
always triumphant, why are its adherents not
always victorious? Why should its purity, its elan,
on occasion be overcome by weakness, by the
passions, by material realities? Why do the wrong
sometimes triumph over the righteous, the
adherents of this faith?
All
these represent questions and doubts, and all
arise in the first place from misunderstanding or
ne-glect of the primary nature of this faith and
its mode of operation.
Naturally
God is capable of transforming human nature, by
means of the religion of Islam or any other
method. But - may He be exalted! - He has chosen
to create man with his present nature in
accordance with His own wisdom. He has chosen to
make divine guidance the fruit of exertion and
desire for it: "Those who strive on our
account, them will We guide to our paths".
[All phrases in quotation marks are from the
Qur'an, unless other-wise specified.] He chose too
to make human nature operate constantly, without
being effaced or put out of action. "The soul
and that which regulates it. He inspired it with
knowledge of its corruption and its piety. He who
purifies it, prospers; and he who corrupts it,
loses thereby". He chose that His di-vinely
ordained path for human life should be realized
through human exertions, within the limits of
human capacities: "Truly God does not change
the state of a people until they change that which
is within them-selves". "Were God not to
repel some people by means of others, truly the
earth would be corrupted". He has chosen
thereby to raise men to a point of ex-cellence
corresponding to the exertions he has made, the
abilities he has applied, and the patience with
which he has met misfortune for the sake of
realizing this divinely ordained path, of removing
evil from himself and from life around him:
"Did the people imagine that they would say:
we have believed, and they would not be tested? We
have tested those before them, and surely God
knows the truthful and God knows the liars.
None
of God's creation has the right to ask Him -may He
be exalted! - why He has chosen all this and
willed it to be. None of His creation - may He be
exalted! - has the right - since he is not a god,
has no knowledge nor the possibility of knowledge
- to ask concerning the general system of
creation, that sys-tem whose results are in the
nature of every created being.
'Why',
in this connection, is a question asked neither by
a serious believer nor by a serious atheist. The
serious believer will not ask it because he is too
polite towards God - Whose essence, attributes and
qualities he knows - and too well aware of the
limited nature of his human perception which is
not equipped to operate in this realm. The serious
atheist will not ask for he does not recognize the
existence of God at all. Were he to recognize His
divinity, he would know too His glory and the
implications of His di-vinity. "He is not
asked concerning what he does, yet they are so
asked". For He alone is omniscient, aware of
what He does.
This
is a question asked only by the frivolous, neither
a serious believer nor a serious atheist.
Therefore, no attention is to be paid to it, and
it is not to be taken seriously. It is asked by
one ignorant of the nature of divinity and its
attributes. The only way to instruct the ignorant
is not by direct answer, but by expounding to them
the nature and attributes of divinity. Then they
will either recognize and accept them, becoming
believers, or they will deny and re-ject them and
become atheists. The controversy is thereby
concluded, unless dispute arises. And if
controversy turns into dispute, the Muslim is not
permitted to continue with it.
The
conclusion we arrive at in this respect is the
following: that none of God's creation - may He be
exalted! - has the right to ask why He has chosen
to create man with the nature he has; why He has
chosen to make the operation of this nature
permanent and uninterrupted; and why He has chosen
to make the di-vinely ordained path for human life
be realized through human existence, rather than
enforcing it miracu-lously, through obscure,
hidden means.
It
is however the duty of every single one of His
creation to perceive and take notice of these
facts, and to observe them in operation in human
life. He should interpret the facts of human
history in their light, understanding their
historical line of develop-ment on the one hand
and knowing how to confront and influence that
line of development on the other. Fur-ther, he
should live with the wisdom and power of God, and
have the correct attitude towards them.
This
divine path, represented in its final stage by
Islam, as entrusted to Muhammad - may the peace
and blessings of God be upon him! - is not brought
into being in the world, in the realm of humanity,
simply by virtue of its revelation by God It is
not brought into being by being preached and
proclaimed to the people. It is not brought into
being by divine enforcement, in the same way that
God enforces His will in the ordering of the
firmament and the revolu-tion of the planets. It
is brought into being by a group of people
undertaking the task, believing in it com-pletely
and conforming to it as closely as possible,
trying to bring it into being in the hearts and
lives of others too; striving to this end with
all, they possess. They struggle against human
weakness and human passion within themselves, they
struggle against those whom weakness and passion
impel to resist divine guidance. They attain
thereby, in the realization of the divine path, a
point made possible by human nature and permitted
material realities. They begin with man as he
stands and do not neglect his actual state and
demands as he passes through and traverses the
stages of the divinely ordained path. This group
will triumph over their own souls and those of
others at times, and at other times will be routed
by their own souls and those of others, in
accordance with the efforts they expend and the
means they choose for the battle, suitable for the
circumstances and the needs of the age. More
important in determining victory or defeat is
however the degree to which they truly, in
themselves, represent this path, and are able to
give it practical expression in their personal
conduct and behavior.
This
is the nature of the faith of Islam and the mode
of its operation. This is its' plan for action and
its method. This is the truth that God wished to
teach the Muslim community when He said:
"truly God does not change the state of a
people until they change that which is within
themselves"; "were God not to repel some
people by means of others, truly the earth would
be corrupted"; and "those who strive on
Our account, them will We guide to our
paths".
This
is the truth that God wished to teach the Mus-lim
community at the battle of Uhud when it failed to
represent the true nature of the faith in its own
self at certain stages in the battle. It neglected
or forgot the primary truth, imagining that
inevitable victory was a consequence of their
being Muslim. God - may He be exalted! - said to
them: "And when you were afflicted with a
calamity similar to one already ex-perienced, you
said: How is this? Say: it is from
yourselves". He also said to them: "God
made true His promise that you might test them
with His per-mission. Yet you failed and disputed
concerning the matter. You rebelled after He had
shown you what you love. There are those among you
who desire the world, and those too who desire the
hereafter. Then He turned you away from them that
He might test you".
The
Muslim community learned this truth at the battle
of Uhud, not by words of reproach, but through
blood and suffering. It paid a high price: defeat
after victory; loss instead of booty; a wound that
left none unaffected; noble martyrs including
Hamza, the fore-most of all martyrs - may God be
pleased with him! - and worse and more serious
than this for the whole Muslim community, the
wounding of the Prophet of God - the blessings and
peace of God be upon him! -the blow struck at his
noble head, the fracture of a tooth in his mouth.
He fell on his side in the pit which had been dug
by Abu Amr, the evil ally of the Quraysh, as an
ambush for the Muslims, while the polytheists were
chasing him. He was alone with a few of his
companions who were martyred one after the other
while defending him. One of them, Abu Dajana,
shielded him with his back against the arrows of
the polytheists. An arrow hit him in the back but
he did not move until the believers returned from
their route, to receive the hard and bitter
lesson!
It
is thus clear that the realization of the divine
path has been left to human exertions. The fact
that it is brought into being within the limits of
human capacities rectifies the human soul and
reforms human life. We say this not in order to
supply a cause for God's will in determining the
matter as He has, but only in order to point out a
practical obser-vation of the effects of this
working of His will in the life of His
worshippers.
The
truth of the faith is not fully established until
a struggle is undertaken on its behalf among
people. A struggle against their unwillingness and
their re-luctance, a struggle to remove them from
this state to that of Islam and truth. A struggle
by word of mouth, by propagation, by exposition,
by refuting the false and baseless with a
statement of the truth pro-claimed by Islam. A
struggle too physically to re-move obstacles from
the path of right guidance when it is infested by
brute force and open violence. In this struggle
misfortune and suffering will be encoun-tered, and
patience will be necessary. In times of victory
too patience is needed: it is then perhaps more
difficult. Then one becomes steadfast and
un-wavering, pursuing the path of the faith
righteously and unswervingly
This struggle is necessary
on the part of the indi-vidual for he struggles
against himself while strug-gling against other
people, and thereby horizons are opened to him in
the faith which would never be opened to him if he
were to sit immobile and at rest. He perceives
facts concerning people and life which he could
not realize in any other way. His soul, his
feelings, his imagination, his habits, his nature,
his reactions and responses - all are brought to a
point of development which he could not have
attained with-out this hard and bitter experience.
This,
among other matters, is implied in God1s saying:
"Were God not to repel some men by means of
others, truly the earth would be corrupted".
The first to be corrupted are human souls, by
means of stagnation overtaking the spirit,
weakening the will and paralyzing it. Then the
whole of life is subject to stagnation, or is able
to operate only within the sphere of the passions,
as happens to nations afflicted with luxury.
This
too is part of the nature in which God created
man. He caused the well-being of this nature to
re-side in struggling for the establishment of the
divine path for human life1 by means of human
exertion and within the bounds of human
capacities.
Moreover,
this struggle and its accompanying trials is the
practical means for purifying the ranks of the
community - after the initial purification of the
individual soul. - of ridding it of the idle and
the hypocrites, of those of weak heart and weak
charac-ter, of tricksters and deceivers.
This is the truth God wishes
to teach the Muslim community when He exposes it
to trial and testing. It is then that the recesses
of souls become known, and the ranks become
clarified, beneath the hammer of trial, the
hardship of experience and the bitterness of
suffering.
This
is the truth God wished to teach the Muslim
community after the battle of Uhud, when He said
in reply to the Muslims' question of 'How is
this?' "Say: this is from yourselves".
He then continues: "That which befell you on
the day the two groups met was with the permission
of God, that He might know the believers and know
the hypocrites". "God did not place the
believers in the state where you find your-selves
for any purpose but this: that He might
distin-guish the evil from the good"...
"So that God might know the believers and
take martyrs from among you - God does not love
the wrongdoers - so that He might test those who
have believed and annihilate the
unbelievers". All this becomes rooted in
their minds, while at the same time their calamity
was caused by shortcomings in applying the
complete meaning of the faith in their thoughts
and actions during the battle. In the end, it was
of benefit for them, through God's grace and
forgiveness of their fault, and because its
consequences were a lesson for them, and a means
of purifying themselves and their ranks.
With
regard to the true nature of the faith and the
mode of its operation, we must add to the remarks
already made a supplementary observation.
The
fact that the realization of this divinely or-dained
path is left to human efforts, within the limits
of human capacities and of the material realities
of human life at various stages of development and
in various environments, does not imply the final
and definite independence of man in this matter,
or his isolation from the divine will and
planning, the aid and assistance of God. To regard
the matter in this manner would be in fundamental
contradiction with the Islamic way of thought.
We
have already remarked that God Almighty helps the
one who struggles for the sake of right guidance:
"And those who struggle for our sake, We
guide them to Our paths". "God does not
change the state of a people until they change
that which is within them".
These
two quotations indicate to us the relation between
human exertions and the aid dispensed by God to
humanity; by means of this aid, men will attain
the good, the right guidance and the virtue for
which they strive.
It
is ultimately God's will which is decisive, and
without which man by himself will attain nothing.
However, this will aid those who know its method
of operation, request its help and seek to attain
the pleasure of God.
Despite
all this, it is divine predestination which
encompasses human beings and events, and trials,
together with their benefit for the righteous,
take place in accordance with it.
Thus,
after the battle of Uhud God Almighty ex-pounds to
the Muslim community the causes of victory and
defeat, indicating too the divine wisdom behind
trials and both victory and defeat. "God made
true His promise that you test them with His
permission. Yet you failed and disputed concerning
the matter. You rebelled after He had shown you
what you love. There are those among you who
desire the world and those too who desire the
hereafter. Then He turned you away from them that
He might test you". His purpose too was to
demonstrate to them His comprehensive path, and
His absolute will and irresistible power behind
all causes and events. 'If a wound afflicts you,
then people have been afflicted with a wound like
it; we cause such fortune to rotate among the
people. It is too so that God may know those who
believe and take from among you martyrs - God does
not love the wrongdoers - and to purify the
believers and to anni-hilate the
unbelievers".
It is, then, in the last
analysis, the plan, the will, the decree of God,
for the accomplishment of what He intends beyond
causes and events. This is the matter concerning
which none may ask God Almighty, and the greatest
truth of the faith. Unless it be firmly
esta-blished in a soul, the faith of that soul is
not com-plete. This is the supplementary remark we
felt it necessary to add to this chapter.
The
Muslim whose heart knows instinctively the nature
of the faith will find here no contradiction, nor
is there any with the contents of the Book of God.
A
UNIQUE PATH
It
is possible that someone will now say: if Islam,
the divinely ordained path for mankind, cannot be
established in the world and the realm of humanity
other than by human exertion, within the limits of
human capacities and the material realities of
human existence in different environments, what
then dis-tinguishes it from man-made paths,
established by men for themselves, and permitting
them to attain a result in accordance with their
exertions, their capa-cities and circumstances?
why must we try to fulfill that path in
particular, for it needs human effort like any
other path? None of it is fulfilled by means of a
miracle or divine enforcement; it is to be
realized within the life of people, within the
bounds of human nature and their normal capacities
and material circumstances.
First we are obliged to
examine the nature of that path so that we may
ourselves realize what is Islam. The first pillar
of Islam is that we bear witness that there is no
god other than God and that Muhammad is the
Prophet of God. The approximate meaning of bearing
witness that there is no god other than God is
this: God is the exclusive possessor of divinity,
and none of His creation shares in any of the
aspects or properties of divinity. The first
aspect of divinity is absolute rule, whence arises
the right to legislate for His worshippers, to
ordain paths for their lives, to prescribe values
on which their lives should be based. It is not
possible to bear witness that there is no god
other than God without recognizing that God alone
has the right to ordain the path which human life
should follow, and without attempting to establish
that path, and none other, in human life. Anyone
who claims for himself the right to lay down a
path for the life of a group of human beings has
claimed also the right of divinity over them, for
he claims the greatest of all aspects of divinity.
Bearing witness that Muhammad is the Prophet of
God means approxi-mately admitting that this path
has been conveyed to from God; that it is truly
God's path for the life of mankind; and that it is
the only path we are obliged to follow and
implement in human life.
Hence we have a duty to
attempt the realization of this path, so that we
may ourselves realize the attri-bute of Muslim
which we claim. This is possible only through
bearing witness that there is no god but God and
that Muhammad is His Prophet. This profession of
faith is possible only by recognizing God as the
sole possessor of divinity, and alone entitled to
lay down a path for human life. We must attempt
the realization of that path conveyed to us from
God by Muhammad, the peace and blessings of God be
upon him.
We must do so for reasons
connected with the na-ture of that path itself. It
is the only path which rea-lizes the nobility of
man, grants him true freedom and releases him from
slavery. It is the only path which enables him to
liberate himself completely within the limits of
his humanity and his service of God, for service
of God releases man from servitude to others.
There is no other path in the world possessing
this quality. For Islam, by recognizing God
Almighty as the sole possessor of divinity, and
hence as the sole possessor of the right to
legislate for the life of humanity, leaves only
one God and one master for humanity. It prevents
some men from being the gods of others with
legislative and directive rights over them, as a
result of the servitude of those who accord these
gods the aspects of divinity.
The divine path is unique in
this respect. Not ver-bally or supposedly, but in
truth and in fact. There-fore the message of all
the prophets - peace and blessings be upon them -
was that God is the sole possessor of divinity,
and to deny to any of His crea-tion any of the
aspects of deity, even if they be dei-fied and
claim the right to legislate for human life,
supported by those who do not believe in the unity
of God.
God said concerning the
Christians and Jews: "They have taken their
rabbis and priests as lords other than God; also
the Christ, son of Mary. Yet they were ordered to
worship one God only. There is no God other than
He. He is glorified above that which they ascribe
to Him". They were not in reality worshipping
the rabbis and priests; they were only according
to them the right to legislate in addition to God,
to lay down a path for human life. God said
concerning them: "They have taken them as
lords". They have flouted God's command
concerning mono-theism, and attribute partners to
Him.
The traditionists Imam
Ahmad, at-Tirmidhi and Ibn Jarir relate concerning
Udayy ibn Hatim that when he heard the call of the
Prophet - peace and blessings be upon him - he
fled to Syria. Before the proclama-tion of Islam
he had accepted Christianity. His sister and a
group of his relatives fell into captivity but his
sister was released by the Prophet - peace and
bless-ings be upon him. She sought out her brother
and aroused his interest in Islam, encouraging him
to go before the Prophet. Udayy came to Medina. He
was one of the chiefs of the Tayy tribe, his
father being the Hatim renowned for his
generosity, so attention was aroused by his
arrival in Medina. As he entered the presence of
the Prophet, wearing a golden cross around his
neck, the Prophet was reciting the verse:
"They have taken their rabbis and priests as
lords besides God". Udayy said: 'They do not
worship them'. The Prophet replied: 'Indeed they
do! The rabbis and priests have made the lawful to
them un-lawful, and the unlawful, lawful. They
have followed them, and this is their worship of
them'.
As Said remarked: 'Ask
advice of men, but com-pare it with the Book of
God'. God Almighty said: "They were ordered
to worship one God only", and if this one God
forbids a thing, it is unlawful; if He per-mits
it, it is lawful; if He legislates concerning a
matter, He should be obeyed; if He commands, His
command should be carried out.
Only Islam restricts its worship to God, since it
regards Him alone as possessing sovereignty and
the right to ordain a path for the life of
mankind. Hence it is only Islam that liberates man
from servitude to other than God, and hence too we
are obliged to at-tempt its implementation, and
that of no other path.
A further reason is that the
divine character of Islam means that it is the
only path free of the results of human desires,
human weaknesses and human self--interest. It is
free from any attempt to gain self-interest by
means of legislating for the benefit of that
individual, his family, class, people or race. The
ordainer of the path of Islam is God Almighty, the
Lord of all mankind. He does not legislate for His
own sake, or for that of one class of mankind in
pre-ference to another, one people in preference
to an-other, or one race in preference to another.
Human legislation, as laid down by a ruling
indi-vidual, family, class, nation or race, cannot
possibly, in the light of human nature, be
unaffected by the de-sires and interests of the
legislator.
When the path ordained by
God is that which rules human life, this defect
disappears, and true, com-plete and comprehensive
justice is obtained, that justice which cannot be
reached by any human, man-made system. There is
nothing in any man-made system which will free it
of the factors of human de-sire, human weakness
and attachment to self-interest in one form or the
other.
There are then lofty divine
instructions for the erection of complete and
comprehensive justice, un-touched by human passion
or considerations of rela-tionship. God said to
the Muslim community: "0 you who believe! Be
upright before God, witnesses to equity. Let not
the hatred of a people inspire you to act with
other than justice. Act justly, for that is closer
to piety. Fear God, for God is aware of what you
do".
It might be asked at this
point: what are the guar-antees that make the
Muslim community establish the justice to which
they are summoned and commanded by God?
The real guarantee of the
entire Islamic program is contained in the
conscience of the individual Mus-lim, and arises
from his faith. Where faith in this religion
exists, there too will be the strongest of
guarantees. The Muslims learn from their religion
that the bases of their existence, their triumph
and power in this world, are all founded on
faithfulness to these instructions. Otherwise
their being is ex-posed to decline, their victory
turns into defeat and they are abased. They hear
God saying to them: "God gives victory to
whom He pleases. Truly God is powerful, mighty.
(He gives victory) to those who, if He gives them
power on earth, establish the prayer, pay the
purifying due, enjoin good and forbid evil. To God
belongs the end of all affairs". They are
con-vinced that God Almighty will pay them no
attention if they deviate from His path.
The Muslim community itself
is the real guarantee for the fulfillment of these
instructions, for it rests on a conviction, and
takes upon itself what God has or-dained for it.
It sees in every neglect or shortcoming the
harbinger of an evil to overtake it, not only the
wrongdoers in its ranks.
So we are obliged to fulfill
this path, to establish that complete and
comprehensive justice which can-not be attained by
any other than this unique path.
A further reason is that
this path alone is free of the results of human
ignorance and human short-comings, as it is free
of the results of human weak-ness. Its ordainer is
the Creator of the human being, and He therefore
knows what is in his interest. He is aware of the
subtleties of his make-up and composi-tion, and
the worldly circumstances that accompany him
throughout his life. When ordaining a path for
man, He takes account of all these factors, which
men, either individually or collectively, in any
age, are incapable of comprehending in their
totality. Certain of these factors require the
accumulation of experience concerning all
manifestations of human life in the past, present
and future - this being im-possible - while others
need awareness of all the de-tails and
circumstances surrounding man, this too being out
of the question. In addition, human per-ception is
unable to form an infallibly correct judg-ment
concerning even the experiences and phenomena of
which it is aware. It is condemned to this
disabi-lity by its partial, non-absolute nature,
and by the influence upon it of passions and
weaknesses. It is therefore unsuited for laying
down a path for human life.
Thus it is that God says:
"Were the truth to fol-low their passions,
the heavens and the earth would be ruined".
Similarly: "We made for you a law, so follow
it, and not the fancies of those who have no
knowledge".
None of the people have
knowledge, that absolute knowledge which is
required for laying down a path human life. They
are equipped with nothing but fan-cies and
ignorance when they undertake the task which is no
concern of theirs and does not properly belong to
them. Their claim to one of the properties of
di-vinity is a great sin, and a great evil.
A further reason for the
implementation of this path is the fact that it
alone erects a system for hu-man life on a
comprehensive view of existence and man's place
therein, and of the true purpose of hu-man
existence - not as it is defined by the ignorance,
weakness and illusion of humanity.
This is the only firm and
healthy basis for the erection of a natural system
of human life. Any sys-tem of human life which
does not rest on the founda-tion of a
comprehensive view of existence is deprived of
natural roots; it is an artificial system that
cannot live long. It is a source of misery for
humanity as long as it exists among them, until
their nature des-troys it and they return to their
natural basis.
This view of existence
contained by the divinely ordained path is the
only correct one. For it pro-ceeds from the
Creator of existence, the Creator of man, who
knows the true nature of existence and man. Any
other view or interpretation of existence and
man's position in it, of the purpose of man's
creation, is a deficient one, for existence is
greater than man, and hence he cannot interpret it
fully. Definition of the purpose of human
existence requires the knowledge of the Creator of
man and of His will in the creation of man. It
further requires immunity from illusion, something
unattainable for man.
If one surveys the efforts
of philosophy to inter-pret human existence, man's
place in it and the pur-pose of human existence,
one encounters an odd as-sortment of answers, some
of them simply ridiculous in their idiocy. One is
surprised that such ideas can have emerged from a
"'philosopher" until one remem-bers that
this philosopher too is a man, equipped only with
the tool of human reason. This is not the realm of
human reason, and the philosophers have strayed
into a region where they have no lamp to guide
them other than that candle granted them by God
for use on different matters and in different
realms - matters wherein the candle may be some
use, a realm where it will shed some light. That
realm is the viceregency of God on earth, in
accordance with the divinely or-dained path,
depending on the grace and assistance of God, as
is understood from a comprehensive inter-pretation
on the basis of which may arise a healthy human
way of thought, and a system of human life with
natural roots.
Hence we are obliged to attempt the realization of
this path in order to establish a system of human
life with natural roots, for there is no other
path which possesses this necessary quality.
A final reason for
attempting the realization of this path is that it
alone is in conformity with the overall plan of
being. Man should not follow a path not In
conformity therewith, since he is obliged to live
with-in its framework, and to cooperate in every
respect with the overall plan of being.
It is only harmony between
the path for human life and that of being that
guarantees for man the coopera-tion of the awesome
forces of nature, and permits him to avoid
conflict with them. If he conflicts with them, he
will be destroyed and annihilated, and he will not
fulfill his duty of viceregency of God on earth,
that duty God has willed for him. If however he
con-forms to the norms of created being, he will
possess knowledge of its secrets and know how to
make use of them in his life. Then fire will not
consume him; in-stead he will use it for cooking,
heating and light.
Human nature conforms
basically to the norms of being when man's way of
life disregards these norms, not only will he come
into conflict with the awesome forces of nature,
but also with his own na-ture. He will be
miserable, bewildered and anxious, living like
present-day man in acute torment, despite all the
triumphs of modern science and all the con-veniences
of material civilization.
Present-day humanity is
afflicted with misery, anxiety, bewilderment and
confusion; it flees from its true self by taking
recourse to opium, hashish and alcohol, to a craze
for speed, to idiotic adventures. All this despite
material prosperity, high productivity and a life
of ease with abundant leisure. In fact, this
emptiness and confusion increase in proportion to
material prosperity and convenience.
This bitter emptiness
pursues man like a fearsome ghost. He flees from
it, but inevitably it overtakes him.
The first impression gained by anyone visiting the
prosperous, wealthy countries of the world -
headed by America and Sweden - is that the people
are fleeing from ghosts pursuing them, fleeing
from their own inner natures. He will quickly
realize that this ma-terial prosperity, sensual
enjoyment and sexual satia-tion lead to a sinking
into the morass of nervous and psychological
disease, sexual perversion, constant anxiety,
illness and lunacy; frequent crime, and the lack
of any human dignity in life.
Humanity has scored great
triumphs, thanks to science, in the field of
medicine and the cure of phys-ical disease. It has
discovered new drugs and means of diagnosis and
treatment; in particular we may mention penicillin
and myosin.
In the sphere of industrial
production too almost miraculous results have been
achieved, and progress and advance are continuing.
Similar achievements in the exploration of space,
in the construction of arti-ficial satellites and
space stations, have been made, and more may be
expected.
But what is the effect of
all this on human life? On the spiritual life of
humanity? Has it found secu-rity? Has it found
peace? By no means! It has found misery anxiety
and fear. No progress has been made in the
formulation of the aims of human life and the
purpose of human existence. when one compares the
concept held by a 'civilized1 man of the purpose
of human existence with the Islamic concept,
present-day civilization appears as a curse
dragging human feelings down into the morass.
For example in America new
gods are worshipped, which are thought to be the
aim of human existence -the god of property, the
god of pleasure, the god of fame, the god of
productivity! Thus it is that in America men
cannot find themselves, for they cannot find the
purpose of their existence. The same is true of
other states of ignorance, where similar gods are
worshipped, and people cannot find the true God.
Therefore we are bound to
attempt the realization of the divinely ordained
path for human life, to turn humanity back towards
its One True God; towards a purpose for existence
worthy of the rank of human being; towards the
norms that embrace all creation including man.
This is the truth
established by the Holy Qur'an. It rejects the
view of those who wish to follow other than the
law of God and the way of life He has ordained.
"Do
they desire other than the way of God, while all
that is in the heavens and earth has submitted
to Him, willingly or unwillingly? And they too
will be brought back before Him."
AN
EASY PATH
It
might then be objected: but humanity will not be
able long to persist on this unique and lofty
path. A group or community, having once
established it for a period, will then abandon it
and humanity will turn to other paths which, while
not causing it to attain the same summits, will
not impose on man the same hard efforts.
At
first sight this objection appears to be valid.
Many writers have attempted to implant this idea
in people's minds, to persuade them that the path
of Is-lam is impractical and unrealistic; too much
for hu-man nature to support for more than a time;
that it is only an idealistic summons to reach
after unattainable horizons. They have had a
cunning aim behind this attempt: to spread despair
at the possibility of recon-structing life in
accordance with the path of Islam, and to
frustrate efforts being made in that direction.
These cunning ones have found in the disorders
that began with the murder of Uthman, the
subsequent con-flict between Ali and Muawiya and
related events a fertile ground for attempting to
prove their vile con-tention, sometimes by
implication and sometimes ex-plicitly, as
circumstances dictate.
They
are unintentionally helped in this aim by those
sincere believers who are disturbed by the fact
that these events should have interrupted the rise
of Islam in that glorious period of history. They
involved too a deviation from the concept of
government that pre-vailed in the time of the
Prophet - may the peace and blessings of God be
upon him! - and his first two successors.
Similarly the conduct of some leaders of the
community thereafter deviated from Islamic norms.
Because of their excessive sensitivity in this
respect, they imagine that all forms of Islamic
ad-vance stopped after the brief period of the
Caliphate. They propound this view with the utmost
sincerity and out of their admiration for the
summit of conduct at-tained by the Prophet and the
Rightly Guided Caliphs.
The
whole matter requires however careful
re-examination, with particular attention to the
human factors involved. The nature of the faith
should be understood, and its method for guiding
the steps of humanity over a long period, in
different environ-ments and circumstances.
First of all, it is not true
that the path of Islam imposes on the soul of man
exertions harder than he is able to bear or to
endure for more than a short time.
It is indeed a sublime path.
But it is at the same time a natural path, and the
capital on which it relies and which it spends is
none other than essential hu-man nature. Its
distinguishing feature is that it knows from the
very beginning how to obtain access to this
capital.
From the outset it is able
to find its way to the hu-man soul. It knows how
it may enter1 and it does so gently. It knows the
strength and capacities of the human soul, and it
never exceeds them. It know8 its needs and
necessities, and responds to them. It knows too
its pure, constructive potentialities, and it puts
them to work for positive ends.
Despite all its sublimity
and loftiness, it is a path essentially for man,
for man living here in this world. It takes into
consideration the nature of man with all its
component parts, and the composition of man also.
When the soul is at one with
its true nature, when its needs and necessities
are fulfilled, when its con-structive capacities
are released, then with ease and without
compulsion it will flow in natural harmony with
life, will ascend to the lofty summit ordained for
it. On its long path to this goal, it will find
ease, security and confidence.
Those who doubt and arouse
doubt concerning the possibility of establishing
the path of Islam are terri-fied by its morality,
by the purity of the moral ele-ment in its
make-up. They are scared by the duties of this
morality, imagining them to be fetters and
obstacles preventing man from striving for what he
de-sires, what his natural instincts impel him
towards.
This
is an illusion arising from a misunderstanding of
the essential nature of the Islamic faith.
The morality of Islam does
not consist of a mere collection of fetters,
obstacles and prohibitions. It is in its essence a
constructive and positive force, a motive force
for continual development and self-realization in
the course of that development. This de-velopment
however is characterized by total purity.
Positiveness
and activity have a moral aspect in the path of
Islam. Idleness and negativism are im-moral, since
they contradict the purpose of human existence, as
conceived of by Islam, namely the vice-regency of
God on earth, and the use of all that God has
subordinated to man for the purposes of
construc-tive activity.
Effort
for the realization ~ the good and the com-bating
of evil is an ethical matter, in which basic
ele-ments of the human personality are released.
In the view of Islam, obedience to God represents
the ethical aspect in a sublime manner.
When
we take the ethical aspects which appear to be
bonds and fetters, we find them in reality to be
as-pects of movement, liberation and vitality.
Let
us take for example self-restraint from
indul-gence of forbidden sexual passion. It
appears to be a bond and an obstacle. But in
reality it represents a liberation from slavery to
these passions, release from servitude to them,
and the exaltation of human will, so that the
indulgence of these passions may be chosen within
the bounds of decency laid down by Is-lam, and
within the sphere of legitimate enjoyment decreed
by God.
Another
example is the ethical injunction to char-ity. It
appears to be a burden on the self, preventing it
from the enjoyment of all it possesses and
influ-encing others thereby. In reality however it
is a re-lease from covetousness and a triumph over
greed, an expansion of consciousness of the public
good, which is not restricted within the framework
of the individual. It is then a release, a
liberation.
We
do not have the space to multiply examples. These
must suffice to give an idea of the true nature of
the moral "bonds" in the Islamic path.
Islam
regards sins and vices as bonds and fetters which
imprison the human soul, weigh it down and drag it
into the abyss. It counts release from the ties of
base desires as true liberation, and its entire
moral system is based on this foundation.
This
is because it regards the basis of human na-ture
as the disposition to good: Man was created in the
fairest of natures. He descends to the lowest
depths whenever he submits to a way of life other
than that ordained by God: "We created man
with the fairest of natures, and then caused him
to descend to the lowest depths, except those who
believe and per-form good works." Therefore,
the way of life con-sonant with man's essential
nature is that which helps him to escape from the
bonds which attach themselves to his virtuous
disposition, and to liberate himself from the
fetters of the passions.
Islam
aspires to lead human society in order to bring
into being circumstances and conditions which will
liberate the individual from perversions that have
latched on to his essential nature; permit the
virtuous and constructive forces within him to
appear and establish their supremacy; and remove
the obstacles which prevent his true nature from
striving towards the good in which it was created.
Those
who imagine that the morality of Islam makes of it
a heavy burden for humanity so as to pre-vent its
realization in their lives, derive this belief
from the tribulations undergone by the individual
Muslim living in a society which is not governed
by Islam. In such circumstances, the morality of
Islam is in reality a heavy burden; it almost
crushes those individuals who live with their pure
Islam in the pol-luted society of ignorance.
This,
however, is not the natural situation fore-seen by
Islam, for it supposes its pure, sublime morality
to be supreme. Islam is a realistic system, and it
therefore supposes that the people who live
according to its path will be living in an
Islamically governed society. In such a society
good, virtue and purity will be well-known and
protected by the leaders of the community. Evil,
vice and impurity will be rejected and banished by
the dominant forces in society.
When
matters are rectified in this manner, the Islamic
way of life becomes an extremely easy one. In
fact, opposition to this way of life on the part
of individuals will become difficult; it will be
difficult for them to indulge in base passions,
and to follow evil and vice. All the forces
dominating society - in addi-tion to the force of
the true nature of man - will stand against them,
and make their divergent path hard and difficult.
Hence
Islam demands that the absolute control of human
society belong to God and the path laid down by
God; it denies this control to any of God1s
creation, and to any path laid down by other than
God. This it would consider complete infidelity
and a clear ascrip-tion of partners to God, for,
as we have already pointed out, Islam insists on
attribution of divinity to God Almighty alone, and
control of human society by His path alone. This
is the direct meaning of bearing witness that
there is none to be worshipped other than God.
Islam
also prescribes the erection of an Islamic society
in the aegis of which the Muslim individual can
live his religion, in accordance with the
charac-ter given him thereby. The Islamic concept
of exist-ence as a whole, and of the aim of human
existence in particular, differs fundamentally
from all man-made imaginings. These picture man in
isolation from the guidance of God in all times
and places. This is a basic difference concerning
which no compromise is possible.
A
specific environment is then indispensable for the
life of this concept, an environment with its own
specific values. This cannot be the environment of
a system based on ignorance of divine guidance. It
will live according to the concept of Islam and
the way of life springing therefrom; it will
breathe naturally in accordance with its own
being, without internal obstacles to slow down or
prevent this growth, and with-out external
obstacles to crush it.
In such an environment the
Muslim individual will live a natural and easy
life, for he will breathe natu-rally, find
assistance in the performance of good deeds, and
experience both inner and social comfort in
following Islamic morality.
Without
this environment the life of the individual
becomes impossible, or at least extremely
difficult. Therefore whoever wishes to be a Muslim
should know that he cannot devote himself to his
practice of Islam except in a Muslim environment
dominated by Islam. He is mistaken if he imagines
that he can realize his Islam as an individual
lost in the midst of a society ignorant of divine
guidance.
The
Islamic path is easy, when one lives in an Is-lamic
environment. It presupposes such an environ-ment
to be indispensable, and all its directives are
based on this foundation.
It
is similarly untrue that it imposes on mankind
more strenuous efforts than are necessary for men
living according to systems emanating from other
than God.
Such
systems - those adopted by mankind in isola-tion
from the guidance of God at any time or place -are
inevitably affected by the results of human
ignor-ance, human weakness and human folly, at the
very best. Hence in whole or in part they will
conflict with human nature, and the soul of
mankind will suf-fer as a result.
They are similarly
characterized by partial cures and solutions for
human problems. They will solve one aspect but
aggravate another, and this as a direct result of
their deficient vision which fails to grasp all
aspects simultaneously. When they cure the new
ill-ness that arose out of their cure of the first
illness, yet another illness will arise, and so on
indefinitely. Study of the changes and stages gone
through by man-made systems bears witness to this.
Without doubt, this imposes on mankind exertions
harder than those involved in that perfect and
comprehensive system which is in accord with
essential human nature, which regards problems
from all their aspects, prescribes for them a
complete and comprehensive solution, and arises
from a complete and comprehensive vision.
Whoever
studies the record of human suffering that has
arisen from man-made systems throughout his-tory,
cannot dare to say that this divinely ordained
path with all its obligations and morality,
imposes on mankind exertions greater than those
imposed by man-made Systems.
The
easiest aspect of this path, which aims to at-tain
a sublime peak, is that it does not ignore the
length of the road, it does not force the pace, it
does not skip stages; the space before it is wide
and exten-sive. It is not contained within the
life-span of an individual, it is not goaded on by
fear of being over-taken by death before the
distant aim is achieved, as are the protagonists
of earthly systems and beliefs. These latter must
complete the task in a single gen-eration, and
violate the tranquility of human nature in order
to leap forward to the realization of a glittering
aim. They have no patience with the tranquil,
natural assured pace. Bloodbaths mark their pro-gress
along their chosen path1 values are destroyed and
standards upset. Finally they themselves are
destroyed beneath the hammerblows of human nature
which their artificial tools are incapable of
resisting.
The
path of Islam is easy and lenient. It encour-ages
human nature to take one direction, discourages it
from taking another direction, and strengthens it
when it weakens. But it never breaks or destroys
it, or attempts to do so. It is patient with it as
the wise and the knowing are patient, like him who
is confident of the realization of the long-term
aim, which cannot be attained in one rush, or even
in two, three, ten, a hundred or a thousand! All
that is demanded is the exertion of effort to
progress along the path.
As
the lofty tree grows after striking its roots deep
in the soil, and its branches reach out and
inter-twine, so too this way of life grows in the
souls and in the world. It expands slowly and
softly, with assur-ance and confidence. Finally it
will be what God has willed it to be.
Islam
sows its seeds and stands guard over them, leaving
them to grow in natural tranquility, and being
assured of the ultimate aim. Whatever slowness or
retreat is observed, this is but in accordance
with human nature. Sometimes plants are covered
over by the sand. are consumed by worms, are burnt
by thirst, are flooded with water, are afflicted
with var-ious catastrophes. But the intelligent
cultivator knows that his plants will survive and
grow, that ul-timately they will surmount all
catastrophes. He does not panic or attempt to
ripen them by unnatural means. Thus too Islam is
characterized by ease, and its obligations sit
light upon the souls of mankind.
We do not need at this point
to speak of the suffer-ings inflicted upon mankind
by the violence of man-made systems and their
protagonists. The wretched-ness it is experiencing
all over the world is enough. Everywhere the
intelligent are raising cries of alarm and
warning.
Finally,
it is not true that this system of Islam did not
survive for long, as some say with cunning and
others with pride! The spiritual, social and
political structure that was erected on the basis
of this sublime, unique system, in the space of a
single century or even half a century, has
continued to resist all the catastrophes that have
beset it, and all the attacks to which it has been
exposed, for more than a thousand years.
These
terrible factors have insistently attacked and
infiltrated its bases, and behind them stand all
the powers of the world of ignorance of divine
guid-ance. They have not been able to destroy it,
but with the passage of time, with concentration
and watchful-ness, with determination and
persistence, they have been gradually eroding it,
and diverting it little by little from its
principles, until eventually it has be-come
weakened and seriously threatened. Nonethe-less,
up to the present they have been unable to dis-tort
its doctrinal foundations, and these doctrines are
available for fresh investigation, to be embraced
by a new generation.
This
is the basic distinction between the divinely
ordained path and manmade paths.
There
is indeed a period of excellence in the his-tory
of this path - and indeed in the history of all
mankind - which is still the sublime summit
towards which necks are craned and gazes directed,
still there in its exalted place.
The period of excellence is
a short one indeed.
It
is not the whole of Islamic history, but a beacon
erected by God so that man might reach up to it
and try to attain it; might renew his hopes of
arriving at the sublime summit by rising in upward
ascent. God assigned to this period its place in
the ascent, the place of a guiding beacon.
The
fact is that this period was not the result of an
unrepeatable miracle; rather it was the fruit of
human exertion made by the first Muslim community.
It can be achieved whenever that exertion is again
made.
But
that exertion undertaken by a select group of
humanity can be a model for many generations of
hu-manity to come, not merely one generation.
Whether or not it will be successful in one
generation or an-other depends on the will of God,
so that the model may take on a realistic form and
encourage its emu-lation. It is then left to
succeeding generations of mankind to attempt again
to attain it. The path continued to play its role,
after that period of excellence, in broad areas of
human life; continued to act upon the ideas, the
history and the situation of mankind for many
centuries; and left many traces on the life of the
whole of humanity. It is precisely this that
enables us to hope that humanity today may again
strive towards the summits.III
AN
EFFECTIVE PATH
This
brilliant illumination achieved a permanent
influence on the life of mankind with its luster
and sublimity, its splendor and perfection. It
left per-manent traces in the history of mankind
as a result of which the present generation of
humanity is better able than all other generations
- after that select group of the first generation
- to strive for the attain-ment of Islam. It is
aided by the legacy bequeathed in ideas, values,
systems, circumstances.
We will try in this chapter
- as briefly as is con-sistent with the nature of
this work - to encompass some of the illuminations
of that bright and unique lamp, not only in the
history of the Islamic commu-nity, but also in the
history of mankind as a whole.
The
period of excellence at the beginning of Islam was
able to create, in the reality of human existence,
a number of ideal personages who were the
represen-tatives of a higher humanity, in a manner
unequalled before or since that time. By
comparison all the figures who arose in paths
other than that of Islam appear as dwarfs, beings
who have not attained full maturity, or at least
not fully rounded beings.
These
ideal personages produced by the divinely ordained
path in that short period were not a few
individuals to be counted on one's fingers, but a
great concourse. The student of the matter wonders
how in all their sublimity and maturity they
attained such numbers, in so short and restricted
a period. He is unable to account for their
appearance on this large scale, at this
exceptional level, with such a variety of models,
unless he relates this unique phenomenon to the
action of that unique path of life - Islam.
It
is important for us to know that those people who
represented a higher humanity, models unique in
their sublimity, by comparison with whom he
figures later centuries appear to be but dwarfs of
deficient beings, who realized the divinely
ordained path in their own lives in this
remarkable manner, were nonetheless human beings,
who had not left the bounds of their nature or
essential disposition, nor sup-pressed any of the
constructive capacities. They did not impose on
themselves exertion beyond their capacities, but
devoted themselves to all human acti-vities, and
enjoyed all the legitimate pleasures which were
allotted to them in their environment and age.
They acted wrongly and correctly, they stumbled
and rose again, they were sometimes beset by human
weakness - like the rest of mankind - and fighting
against it were sometimes triumphant.
It
is highly important to realize this fact. It gives
mankind a strong hope for the resumption of
struggle; it makes it the duty and right of
mankind to strive for that bright and feasible
ideal, and to continue striving. It causes mankind
to gain in self-confidence and to trust in its own
inner nature and hidden potentialities, which
enable it - if the correct path is followed - to
reach that level of higher humanity which It once
at-tained in the course of its history. It did not
attain it by an extraordinary and unrepeatable
miracle. It attained it by means of a path
corresponding to its own nature, one realized by
human efforts and within the bounds of human
capacities.
That
great and exceptional generation arose in the
heart of the poverty-stricken desert, poor in
natural1 economic and scientific resources.
Although this en-vironment was suitable to the
rise of such a gener-ation, humanity, today and
tomorrow, is not inca-pable, either by virtue of
its inner nature or by virtue of its
potentialities, of succeeding once again in its
exertions, providing it takes the divinely
ordained path as its guide.
This
path - despite the deviations, hostility and
attacks it has suffered in the course of time -
conti-nued to produce ideal men, similar to those
of the first brilliant generation, influenced and
moulded by its example. It continued to influence
strongly the life of humanity through those ideal
men, and to affect the course of human history. It
left deep traces and impresses on the nature of
life and the world.
This
path at all times is still capable of producing
such ideal men, so long as serious efforts are
made for applying and fortifying it in life,
irrespective of all opposing factors and all
obstacles in its path.
The
secret hidden within it is its direct coopera-tion
with the essential nature of man, and its exploit-ation
of his potential resources. These resources are
considerable and permanent. When they come into
contact with this path, streams of wealth gush
forth, and the hidden superabundance stands
revealed.
This
ideal period of excellence was able to esta-blish
for human life principles, ideas, values and
criteria which had no precedent in the whole
history of humanity, all of them clear, profound,
comprehensive and vital. None them were
established at any other time in human history, by
any other path or system on earth, with such
clarity, profundity, comprehensiveness and
vitality. Nor - which is the most important - with
such truthfulness, seriousness, sincerity and
profound devotion to truth.
These
principles ideas, values and. criteria em-braced
every sector of human life. They embraced the
human concept of God, and the relation of human-ity
to Him; the human concept of existence, of the
purpose of existence, its general place and
function in the universe.
Consequently,
they dealt too with the concept of the real nature
of the human being, his rights, duties and
obligations; the criteria for judging his life,
activity and rank, on which are based too his
relations with his Sustainer and with his
fellow-beings, his relations with the totality of
creation, with living beings and With objects.
They, dealt too with
political, social and economic rights and duties,
systems, the situations and rela-tionships that
connect together these rights and duties. In
short, all fields of' human life with their
different features and aspects were covered.
On
all of these, this ideal period impressed its own
distinctive nature, its unique divine, stamp.
All
this took place in a local, environment hostile to
these principles and ideas, these values and
criteria, in a worldly atmosphere denying their
very basis, in economic, political and social
circumstances bound by their very nature to cash
with the attitudes in-culcated by Islam and
established for the first time in the actuality of
human life. At the very least they did not favor
the swift movement of Islamic ideals. It relied
for its success above all on the capacities of
human nature for responding to the divinely
ordained path - which profoundly corresponds to
human nature - rather than being overwhelmed by
superficial impressions. It activated this
potential and brought it out from behind the
clouds that were obscuring it. It is indeed a vast
potential, capable - if the correct path for
freeing it from confusion, and sloth exists - of
resisting superficial impressions, which are in
the eyes of some shortsighted people the be-all
and end all of human life. Islam does not ignore
these impressions, nor does it neglect their
effects on human life. But neither does it
surrender to them, regarding them as an
inescapable reality. Instead it has recourse to
the potentialities of human nature, at-tempts to
concentrate and direct them in order to modify
reality, gently and painlessly in the manner of
operation described in the previous chapter. The
result will then be what was attained in the ideal
period: negative local and worldwide circumstances
were combated and transformed into positive
favor-able circumstances. This took place both in
the Arabian Peninsula and beyond.
Humanity
today is, in some respects, in a better position
than it was when this divinely ordained path was
first brought. In a short period it has brought
about a great revolution in prosperity and
comfort, is better able to work according to the
path, for rea-sons to be set forth in a future
chapter. Its capacity to endure is greater,
especially since we know that the potential of
human nature, despite the clouds of corruption,
evil and perversion that hang over it, and despite
the material conditions and economic and in-tellectual
factors that threaten to crush it, is able to
arise, collect itself and work. This ability is
rea-lized when the divinely ordained path
releases, con-centrates and directs it, sends it
on the course which is in accord with the
essential nature of man and the essential nature
of creation as willed by God. This potential, in
view of its purity, profundity and vast-ness, is
superior to all other factors which take on the
aspect of "reality". What matter, then,
if today these factors stand opposed to it?
In the eyes of some who do
not know the true nature of this path,
"reality" appears to be something
un-changeable, irreversible and almighty!
This
is a great illusion. The essential nature of the
human being is also a "reality". It is
not in ac-cord with outward reality, since
everywhere it is suffering from it. Whenever the
essential nature of humanity clashes with a
certain circumstance or sys-tem, it is at first
defeated, because behind the cir-cumstance or
system there is a material force which imposes
itself. These is however no doubt that hu-man
nature is stronger and more lasting than any
incidental circumstance, and that it will
inevitably triumph in the end, particularly when
it is directed in a path the nature of which
corresponds to its own nature.
This
has already happened once1 on that day when the
divinely ordained path confronted the
"reality" of the Arabian peninsula, and
the)"reality" of the entire world. It
triumphed brilliantly over that reality,
transformed its intellectual and practical bases
and erected it on new foundations.
This
did not take place through some unique,
unrepeatable miracle. It was achieved - in
accordance with God's everlasting custom - through
human exertion, and within the bounds of human
capacities. This precedent indicates the
possibility of its own repetition.
The
legacy of that brilliant period, the traces it has
left in the life of mankind and the reality of
his-tory, are all favorable factors for a new
struggle.
That
period was able to establish in the life of
mankind practical traditions and realistic
institutions, based on its own principles, ideas,
values and cri-teria, that did not die and
disappear with the end of an era. They extended
like a moving stream impelled to the far corners
of the earth, and consecutive eras and epochs. The
life of all humanity was affected by them, in one
way or another, and they became a re-source for
mankind, to which it had recourse for more than a
thousand years. They affected ideas,
circumstances, traditions, science and economy,
all the spheres of civilization. Their traces
still continue to affect the life of humanity down
to the present, despite all the forces which
resist this floodtide, and despite the relapse of
the western world, which has dominated the entire
earth for some time, into Greco-Roman ignorance of
divine guidance.
There
have been established in the life of man-kind,
beyond their specific effects, principles and
values, theories and institutions, whose real
origin is unknown to present-day humanity, and
whose source is ascribed to something other than
that di-vinely ordained and effective path. It is
not how-ever impossible to recognize its first
origin and thereby to return to following the
divine path and rea-1izing its effects in human
life. In a following chapter we will indicate some
of the long strides taken by hu-manity towards
establishing that path today, which when Islam
first appeared it strongly rejected; thir-teen
hundred odd years ago!
It
is possibly because of these steps taken in the
life of humanity and because of its present
situation that humanity is in general nearer today
to under-standing the path of Islam, for it is in
possession of the legacy of the first wave,
something it did not enjoy when Islam first came.
It similarly enjoys a stock of experiences derived
from periods of devia-tion from the path of Islam,
and the cares that today afflict it as a result.
These are some of the factors favorable to an
acceptance of the divine path and en-able patience
in the coming struggle; God willing.
THE
POTENTIAL OF HUMAN NATURE
When
Islam was first revealed, it confronted a huge
"reality", namely the Arabian Peninsula
and beyond it the entire world. Beliefs, ideas,
values, criteria, systems, circumstances,
interests and loyalties - all these resisted it.
The distance between Islam,
when it was first revealed and the actual states
of people in the Arabian Peninsula and the world,
was huge and over-whelming. Those actual states
were reinforced by centuries of history, by
various interests, different forces all of which
formed a barrier in the path of this new faith.
The new faith was not content with changing
beliefs, ideas values, criteria, customs,
traditions, ethics and feelings; it insistently
wanted to change also, systems, institutions, laws
and the distribution of wealth and livelihood. It
insisted too on removing the control of humanity
from the hands of oppression and ignorance, and
restoring it to God and to Islam.
If
it had been said to someone living at the time,
that the new faith attempting all that, in the
face of so overwhelming a reality and all the
forces on earth, would triumph and transform that
reality in the course of half' a century, the only
response would have been scorn and disbelief.
But
this huge overwhelming reality was soon obliged to
retreat from its position and to yield to the
newcomer. Soon the new leader assumed the
leader-ship of humanity in order to bring it out
from dark-ness into light, through the Law of God
and under the banner of Islam.
How
could this be? It seemed impossible for the one
dazzled by "reality" and crushed by its
weight as he weighed affairs and circumstances.
How could a single man, Muhammad the son of
Abdullah, the Peace and Blessings of God be upon
him, stand alone against the whole world, or at
least against the Arab Peninsula at the beginning?
Or at least against the Quraysh, the lords of the
Arabs at the beginning of his mission? Against all
those beliefs, ideas, values, criteria, systems,
institutions, interests and loyal-ties, and then
triumph over them all? And change them all, erect
a new system, on the basis of the new path and the
new idea?
He
did not flatter their ideas and beliefs, truckle
to their feelings and sentiments, or compromise
with their leadership. He did not humble himself
in order to secure his position. He was ordered at
the very beginning, when he was in Mecca and all
the forces were ranged against him: "Say: 0
unbelievers! I worship not that which you worship.
Nor do you wor-ship which I worship. Nor do I
worship that which you have worshipped. Nor do you
worship that which I worship. To you, your
religion, and to me, mine"
He
did not consent himself with proclaiming the
separation between his religion and theirs, and is
form of worship and theirs, and the unbridgeable
gap between them. Rather he was ordered to prevent
them from hoping for the realization of any
compro-mise in the future. He repeated to them:
"Nor do I worship that which you have
worshipped. Nor do you worship that which I
worship". He was commanded to emphasize the
unbridgeable gap between them: "To you, your
religion, and to me, mine".
He
did not dazzle them with any claim to mysterious
power, to superhuman privileges of unseen origin.
He was commanded to say: "Say: I do not tell
you that I have the treasuries of God, or
know-ledge of the unseen, nor do I say to you that
I am an angel. I follow only that which is
revealed to me" (al-An'am, v.50)
He
did not distribute promises of high office and
wealth to those who followed. him, when he
triumphed over his opponents. Ibn Ishaq said:
"The Prophet -may the Peace and Blessings of
God be upon him! - showed himself to the tribes at
the season of the pil-grimage saying: 0
such-and-such a tribe! I am the messenger of God
to you, commanding you to worship Him and not to
ascribe Him any partners; to abandon whatever
idols you worship in His place; to believe in me
and to help me so that I may proclaim the message
God has entrusted to me".
Ibn
Ishaq also records as follows: "I was
informed by al-Zahri that the Prophet went to the
tribe of Banu Amir bin Sa'sa'a, summoning them to
the worship of God Almighty. He appeared before
them and a man from among them, by name Bayhara
bin Firas, said: "By God, were I to take this
man from Quraysh with his help I would devour all
the Arabs". He then asked of the Prophet:
"If we vow allegiance to you and then God
gives you victory over your enemies, will we
en-joy power after you? The Prophet replied:
"Power belongs to God; He places it where He
pleases". He answered: 'You wish us to fight
against the Arabs, and then if God supports you,
power will not be ours? We have no need of your
cause'. And they rejected him".
How
'then did it all come about? How was that single
individual able to overcome all that
"reality"?
He did not overcome it by
some extraordinary, unrepeatable miracle. He
proclaimed - may the Peace and Blessings of God be
upon him! - that he would not perform any such
miracles, and he never - not even once -
considered it necessary to attract attention by
such means. That which took place did so in
accordance with a constant and repeatable method
that holds true whenever people invoke it.
The
triumph of the divinely ordained way of life took
place because of its cooperation - beyond apparent
reality - with the hidden potentialities of human
nature. This potential, as we - have already
pointed out, is vast and huge; superficial clouds
cannot overcome it when it is liberated,
concentrated, directed and released in a certain
direction.
Perverted
and corrupt beliefs were enthralling mankind.
False gods were crowding the courtyard of the
Ka'ba and the minds, imaginations and hearts of
men. Tribal and economic interests were based on
these false gods, and behind them stood the
guardians of the Ka1ba and the soothsayers. This
situation derived from the distribution of the
attributes of divinity among men, and from giving
to the guardians of the Ka1ba and the soothsayers
the right to legislate for the people and to lay
down a path for their life.
Islam
came to oppose this "reality" with, the
One True God. It addressed itself to true human
nature which knows only the One True God, and
informed the people of their true Lord, His
attributes and properties, which were already
known to human nature be-neath the debris of false
beliefs.
"Say:
shall I take to myself as protector other than
God, the Originator of the heavens and of the
earth, He who feeds and is not fed? Say: I have
been commanded to be the first of them that
surrender unto God: "Be not thou of the
idolaters". Say: "Indeed I fear if I
should rebe1 against my Lord, the chastisement
of a dreadful day". From whomsoever it is
averted on that day, He will have mercy on him;
that is the manifest triumph. And if God visits
you with affliction, none can remove it but He;
and if He visits you with good, He is powerful
over everything. He is omnipotent over His
servants, and He is the All-wise, the All-aware.
Say: "what thing is greatest in
testimony?" Say: "God is witness
between me and you; and this Qur'an has been
revealed to me, that I may warn you thereby, and
whomsoever it may reach. Do you indeed testify
that there are other gods with God?" Say:
"I do not testify". Say: "He is
only one God, and I am free of what you
associate unto Him". (al-An-am, vv. 14-19)
"Say:
'I am forbidden to serve those you call on apart
from God". Say: 'I do not follow your
caprices, or else I had gone astray and would
not be of the right-guided". Say: "I
stand upon a clear sign from my Lord, and you
would have cried lies to it. Not with me is that
which you seek to hasten; the judg-ments is
God's alone. He relates the truth, and He is the
best of deciders." Say: "If what you
seek to hasten were with me, the matter between
you and me would be decided; and God knows very
well the evil-doers".
With him are the keys of the
Unseen; none knows them but He. He knows what is
in land and sea; not a leaf falls, but He knows
it. Not a grain in the earth's shadows, not a
thing, fresh or withered, but it is in a Book
Manifest. It is He who recalls you by night, and
He knows what you mark by day; then He raises you
up therein, that a stated term may be determined;
then He raises you up therein, that a stated term
may be determined; then unto Him shall you return,
then He will tell you of what you have been doing.
He is the Omnipotent over His servants. He sends
record-ers over you till, when anyone of you is
visited by death, Our messengers take him and they
neglect not. Then they are restored to God their
Protector, the True. Surely His is the judgment;
He is the swiftest of reckoners.
Say:
"Who delivers you from the shadows of land
and sea? You call upon Him humbly and secretly,
'Truly, if Thou deliverest from these, we shall
be among the thankful". Say: 'God delivers
you from them and from every distress; then you
assign Him associates'. Say: "He is able to
send forth upon you chastisement, from above you
or from under your feet, ~r to confuse you in
sects and to make you taste the violence of one
another". Behold how we turn about the
signs that maybe they will understand. (al-An'am,
vv. 56-65)
Essential
human nature listened to this non-create voice
that addressed it through the clouds of a heavy
reality", in the wide waste of error. It
returned to its One True God, and the new summons
triumphed over the weighty "reality"!
When
men returned to the One God, it became im-possible
for people to worship people All stood erect in
dignity before each other, on the day when all
heads were bowed in front of the One Omnipotent
God. The legend of superior stock and race, of
inherited nobility, rule, and kingship - all this
same to an end.
How
did this come to be?
There
was a social reality, backed by class, racial,
material and intellectual interests, dominant in
the Arabian Peninsula and in the surrounding
world. None objected to this reality, for those
who profited by it did not tire of it, and those
crushed by it were not able to condemn it.
The
Quraysh called themselves "the noble"
and attributed to themselves rights and traditions
not granted to the other Arabs. During the
pilgrimage, they would stay at Muzdalifa while all
others would be at 'Arafat. On the basis of these
privileges, they enjoyed economic. advantages over
the rest of the Arabs. Thus they, forbade
circumambulation of the, Ka'ba in clothes, other
than those bought from the Quaraysh. Otherwise it
was to be peerformed in, a state of nudity.
The
world surrounding the Arabian peninsula was
groaning under the weight of, discrimination based
on blood and race.
"Iranian
society was based on discrimination of stock and
profession. An unbridgeable gap existed between
the classes of society. The state forbade the
general2 population from buying the property of
a prince or a notable. One, of the, base of the
Sasanian polity was that each individual s.houl4
content himself with the position bestowed. upon
him by his descent, and should not strive for
something beyond it. None might engage in a
trade other than that God had created him for.
The kings of Iran did not delegate a single one
of their duties to a commoner. The common people
were similarly divided into distinct classes,
each of which had a well-defined position in
society" (Quotation from Arthur
Christensen's work on Iran in the Sasa-nid
period)
"The
kings of Iran used to claim that divine b1ood
ran in their veins. The Persians used to regard
them as gods, and to believe that there was
something sublime and divine in their natures.
They begged them for forgiveness of their sins,
sang hymns in praise of their divinity, and
regarded them as above law, above criticism and
above humanity. They might not men-tion their
names or sit in their assemblies. They believed
that they had a claim to all men, but had
themselves no obligations to others. Any paltry
gift bestowed out of their superfluous wealth
was an un-deserved act of charity towards a
people whose only duty was subordination and
obedience. All this is true in particular of a
certain house, that of the Kaya-nis, who alone
were regarded as fit to bear the crown and to
exact tribute. These rights were transferred
from father to son, and only the unjust would
dispute them. They believed in the institution
of monarchy and its hereditary transference
within the royal house, desiring no substitute
for this system. If an adult could not be found
among them to rule, then a child would come to
the throne. If a man was not to be found, then a
woman would rule over them. After Shirvayh, his
son Ardeshir came to the throne at the age of
seven. Similarly, Farrokhzad Khosrou. Son of
Khosrou Parviz came to the throne while still a
child. A second daughter of Khosrou, by name
Azarmaidukht, was appointed to rule, and it did
not occur to anyone to choose some great general
or leader such as Rustam or Jaban, simply
because they were not related to the royal
household." (Quotation from Abul Hasan al-Nadawi's
'What the World has lost by the Decline of the
Muslims).
The
caste system' in India represented the vilest and
harshest of man's deeds to man.
"Three
centuries before Christ, the Brahmin
civi-lization flourished in India which gave a
new impress to Indian society. A new civil and
political law was religious authority. This was
known as the Manushastra.
"This
law divided the people into four distinct
classes. Firstly, the Brahmins, the caste of the
soothsayers and the men of religion. Secondly,
the Kshatris, the men of war. Thirdly, the
Vaishyas, the cultivators and merchants.
Fourthly, the Shudras, the servants.
"Manu,
the author of this law, says:
"The
Absolute and Almighty One, in the interest of
the world, created the Brahmins from his mouth,
the Kshatris from His arms, the Vaishyas from
His thighs, and the Shudras from His legs. He
distri-buted among them various obligations and
duties for the sake of the world. The Brahmins
are to teach the Vedas and offer up sacrifices
to the gods and to dis-tribute alms. The
Kshatris are to guard the people, to offer up
sacrifices, to study the Vedas and to shun the
passions. The Vaishyas are to pasture cattle, to
read the Veda and to engage in trade and
agricul-ture. The Shudras are only to serve the
other three classes".
"This
law granted to the Brahmin caste rights and
privileges that bestowed on them almost the
status of gods. It said that they were the
chosen of God and the lords of creation; all
that existed in the world was their property;
they were the most noble of creatures and the
masters of the world. They might take away from
their Shudra slaves - without any crime -
what-ever they wanted. For the slave possesses
nothing, and all his property belongs to his
master. The Brahmin who memorizes the Rigveda
has all his sins forgiven, even if his sins and
foul deeds were to anni-hilate the universe. The
king is not permitted, even in the direst hours
of need, to impose any levy on the Brahmins or
tribute. No Brahmin may be permitted to die of
hunger, even though he may be deserving of
death".
"The
Kshatris, even though superior to the Vaish-yas
and the Shudras, are far inferior to the
Brahmins. Manu says: "The ten-year old
Brahmin is superior to the centenarian Kshatri,
in the same way as the father is superior to his
son".
"As
for the "untouchable" Shudras, they
were in Indian society, on the basis of this
religious and civil code, lower than beasts and
more despised than dogs. The law declares:
"It is the happiness of the Shudra to serve
the Brahmin, and for this they need no re-muneration
or reward. They may not acquire wealth or store
up treasure, for this pains the Brahmin. If a
Shudra stretches out his hand or a stick to
attack a Brahmin, then his hand shall be cut
off. If he kicks him in anger, his foot shall be
severed; if an untouch-able attempts to sit in
the company of a Brabmin, the king shall brand
his posterior, or banish him from the realm. If
he reviles a Brahmin, his tongue shall be
plucked out. If he lays claim to acquaintance
with a Brahinin, he shall be made to drink
boiling oil. The compensation to be paid for the
murder of an un-touchable is the same as that to
be paid for a dog, a cat, a frog, a lizard, a
crow or an owl". (Quoted from the same work
of Abul Hasari Nadawi)
As
for the celebrated Roman civilization, it was
based on luxury that the slaves - three quarters
of the population - provided for the nobility -
the remaining quarter. In law too there was
discrimination between slaves and masters, between
noble and plebeian classes.
In
the famous code of Justinian we read as follows:
"Whosoever
ravishes a respectable widow or a virgin, his
punishment, if he be from a noble house-hold, is
the forfeiture of half of his wealth. If he be
from a lowly family, he shall be scourged and
driven out of the land".
While
this was the state of affairs throughout the
world, Islam addressed itself directly to the true
and essential disposition of man, which
unwittingly re-jected and disapproved of this
position. Its response to the call of Islam
entirely overcame the prevailing situation.
The
nature of man heard God Almighty addressing the
totality of mankind: "0 people, we have
created you of male and female, and made of you
people and tribes that you might recognize one
another. Truly the most noble of you in the sight
of God is the most God-fearing among you".
(al-Hujrat, v.13)
It
heard Him too addressing Quraysh in particular:
"Then
run forth (in the pilgrimage) where the others run
forth". (al-Baqara, v.199)
It
heard the Prophet of God - may the Peace and
Blessings of God be upon him! - addressing all
men: "0 people! Your Lord is one. Your
ancestor is one. You all belong to Adam, and Adam
was of clay. The most noble of you in the sight of
God is the most God-fearing among you. There is no
superiority of Arab over non-Arab, of non-Arab
over Arab, of the dark-skinned over the
fair-skinned, of the fair-skinned over the
dark-skinned, unless it be by piety and fear of
God".
It
heard him addressing the Quraysh in particular
saying:
"0
assembly of Quraysh! Buy your souls, for nothing
will avail you against God. 0 sons of Abd Manaf,
nothing will avail you against God. 0 Abbas ibn
Abdul Mutallib, nothing will avail you against
God. O Fatima daughter of Muhammad, demand from
me what you will of my wealth, for nothing will
avail you against God".
Human
nature heard and responded, and the con-sequences
followed in accordance with God1s eternal custom
that may recur at any time.
The
system of usury prevailed in the Arabian
Peninsula, and the entire economy was based on it.
Let no one imagine that it was a question simply
of isolated transactions between individuals. The
Qu-raysh undertook a considerable trade with Syria
in the summer and the Yemen in the winter. The
capital of the Quraysh was invested in this trade.
Let us not forget that the caravan of Abu Sufyan
that the Muslims ambushed at the battle of Badr
and then evaded them to be replaced by God with
something better for them, contained a thousand
camels loaded with goods. If usury had simply been
practiced in restricted indi-vidual dealings, and
not been a comprehensive system of economic life,
it would not have deserved the re-peated and
scorching attack made on it by God Al-mighty in
the Qur1an, and the pursuance of that attack by
the Prophet - may the Peace and Blessings of Good
be upon him! - in the Hadith.
This
capital, this commercial activity, this eco-nomy -
all were based on the system of usury. Short-ly
before the mission of the Prophet, the economies
of various countries came to be gathered into this
system, as for example in Medina, where the eco-nomy
was dominated by the Jews. Usury is in fact the
basis of the economic system of the Jews.
This
was the economic "reality" on which the
life of the land was based.
Then
Islam came, denying and rejecting this un-just and
criminal system, and setting forth in its stead a
new basis: that of zakat, of the goodwill loan, of
cooperation and mutual solidarity.
"Those
who expend their wealth night and day, secretly
and in public, their wage awaits them with their
Lord, and no fear shall be on them, neither
shall they sorrow. Those who devour usury shall
not rise again except as he rises, whom Satan of
the touch prostrates; that is because they say
'Trafficking is like usury'. God has permitted
trafficking and has forbidden usury. Whosoever
receives an admonition from his Lord and gives
over, he shall have his past gains, and his
affair is committed to God; but who-soever
reverts - those are the inhabitants of the Fire,
therein dwelling forever. God blots out usury,
but freewill offerings He augments with
interest. God loves !1ot any guilty ingrate.
Those who believe and do deeds of righteousness,
and perform the prayer, and pay the alms - their
wage awaits them with their Lord, and no fear
shall be on them, neither shall they sorrow. 0
believers, fear you God; and give up the usury
that is outstanding, if you are believers. But
if you do not, then take notice that God shall
war with you, and His messenger; yet if you
repent, you shall have your principal,
unwronging and unwronged. And if any man should
be in difficulties, let him have re-spite till
things are easier; but that you should give
freewill offerings is better for you, did you
but know. And fear a day wherein you shall be
returned to God, and every soul shall be paid in
full what it has earned; and they shall not be
wronged". (al-Baqara, vv. 274-281)
Human
nature found that the summons of God was better
than the situation in which it found itself. It
grew disgusted with the vile system on which usury
subsisted. Despite the hardships involved in
changing the economic situation on which the life
of people was based, the response of human nature
again proved stronger than the weight of
"reality'1. Muslim society was purged of that
pollution from the days of ignor-ance. This too
took place in accordance with the custom of God
which repeats itself whenever human nature is
summoned out from behind the debris of false
belief.
In
this chapter we will content ourselves with these
three examples of the triumph of true human nature
over "reality", of its emergence from
the debris of false beliefs, its victory over the
external "reality" which had been
erected by human ignorance of divine guidance.
This reality consisted of beliefs and ideas,
circumstances and traditions, economic factors.
All these appear to the one who is unaware of the
power of faith and of true human nature to be an
overwhelming and irresistible fact.
Islam
did not fold its hands in surrender to this
"reality". It abolished it, or changed
it, and erected in its place its own sublime and
unique structure, on its firm and profound basis.
What
happened once can happen again. What hap-pened was
in accord with a continuing custom, not an
extraordinary miracle. That structure arose out of
the potential of human nature, a potential
available to all who wish to exploit it, to
concentrate it, direct it and release in the
correct direction.
Humanity
today may well be better able to follow that
direction, because of the traces left on its his-tory
by that first wave of Islam, which confronted the
harshest opposition, but continuing on its path
left behind it the most profound of imprints.
THE
RESOURCES OF EXPERIENCE
When
Islam confronted humanity for the first time, it
had at its disposal in meeting the challenge of
the prevailing situation only the potential of
human nature. Human nature stood on the side of
Islam, despite the long centuries that had passed
by during which the debris of the age of ignorance
of divine guidance had piled up on it. Human
nature was able to free itself, and its response
to Islam was enough to clear away the debris.
That
was a remarkable period, a sublime summit, an
exceptional generation of men, a bright beacon. It
was, as we have said, decreed and willed by God,
so that this unique image might be materialized in
the situations of real life and recourse might
later be had to it, in order to repeat it within
the limitations of human capacity.
It
was not the natural outcome of its environment,
but rather the fruit of the actualized potential
of hu-man nature, when it found the path, the
leadership, guidance and the movement to bring
into action and impel it forwards.
However, humanity as a whole
was not yet pre-pared to remain for long at that
lofty summit which that select group of men had
ascended. When Islam spread throughout the earth
with such amazing speed, unparalleled in the
course of history, and the people in their masses
entered the religion of God; when the mass of the
Islamic community did not receive the deep, unique
and gradual training that select group had
received; then the pressure of remnants from the
age of ignorance surviving in the masses who had
pledged allegiance to Islam, began to drag down
the entire body of the community from the lofty
heights to level ground. Only a great leap could
lift the com-munity up to those heights, such as
that of the select group who had received a
unique, profound and grad-ual training, a training
which had mobilized the re-sources of human nature
and released them in the correct direction.
So
the Muslim community remained for more than a
th6usand years not at a lofty peak, but at
different levels, all of them higher than those of
other societies throughout the world. Indeed,
other societies sought help from it, as history
bears witness, if it is honest. But how rare is
honest history!
That
unique leap forward in the history of mankind, and
the high levels maintained for a thousand years
thereafter, were not in vain, nor were they lost
to the world of humanity, for they left behind a
different world from that which they had first
encountered.
Such
is not the custom of God with regard to life and
to man. Mankind is a cohesive unit over a long
span of time, and the body of humanity is a vital
or-ganism which makes use of its store of
experiences and accumulates resources of
knowledge. These re-sources, however much they
were covered up by clouds of ignorance and however
much dominated by blindness and darkness, remained
immanent and per-manent, and even circulating
through the body of mankind.
If
the call of Islam at first found only the
potential of human nature with which it might
oppose and con-front the actual situation of man
(excluding the slight potential represented by the
previous messages which had been set to certain
nations, rather than to the whole of humanity,
like Islam), today it has at its disposal not only
this potential but also the resources brought into
being by the first wave of Islam - those who
believed in Islam, lived under its rule and were
influenced by it. Similarly it disposes of the
bitter experiences of mankind collected in the
wasteland of isolation from God.
Principles,
ideas, values, criteria, systems and institutions
confronted by Islam at the very beginning when it
had at its disposal only the resources of hu-man
nature, it condemned and resisted utterly. Then
the principles, ideas, values, criteria, systems
and institutions of Islam established themselves
in the life of a group of men for a period of
time. Thereafter they were established in the
broad Islamic world, at different levels, for a
further period. Finally they became known to
almost the entirety of humanity, for approximately
thirteen hundred years. They were known of as a
dream, as a hope, if not in practice, devotion and
experience.
Hence
they did not appear strange to mankind as they had
on the day when Islam was first proclaimed. They
did not appear reprehensible to its feelings and
customs as they had then. It is true that mankind
did not experience them as did that select group
of the first generation of Muslims in that unique
period. It is also true that when it attempted to
apply some of them at different times, including
the modern era, it failed to perceive their spirit
and to apply them in accordance therewith. It is
true that it is still stumbling as it seeks to
mount towards the peak the early Muslims attained
at one leap.
Despite
all this, humanity as a whole, from the
intellectual viewpoint, is closer to perceiving
the true nature of this divinely ordained path,
and to being able to follow it, than it was when
Islam was first revealed.
Specific
examples will clarify this point. We will select
only a few; without treating 'them in detail. This
for two reasons: firstly, the present discussion
is only a brief indication of the elements
contained within the great topic of the Islamic
faith. Secondly, the broad lines which have been
traced by the first wave of Islam in the life of
the whole of humanity and of all regions of the
earth, are too numerous, signi-ficant and
extensive to be dealt with by a single writer in a
single work. These traces have sunk into the life
of humanity since that distant period, and have em-braced
the being of all humanity on a broad scale in a
manner not entirely visible to the observer.
It is possible to say - by
way of summary - that this universal phenomenon
which manifested itself on the planet earth,
namely the religion of Islam, did not leave
unvisited a single aspect of human life, and
al-though its influence may differ in degree of
intensity, the reality of its effect is not to be
doubted. Every single one of the great movements
of history derived, directly or indirectly, from
that momentous happen-ing; or, to be more precise,
from that vast universal phenomenon.
The
movement of religious reform, undertaken by Luther
and Calvin in Europe; the renaissance from which
Europe is still nourished today; the destruction
of the feudal system and liberation from
aristocratic rule; the movement of equality and
the rights of man which appeared in the Magna
Carta in England and the French Revolution; the
experimental method on which is based the
scientific glory of Europe - all these, which are
commonly accepted as chief developments of
history, were derived from that great Islamic wave
and fundamentally and profoundly influenced by it.
Dr.
Ahmad Amin writes in his book "The Dawn of
Islam":
"Movements
arose among the Christians bearing the trace of
Islamic influence, among them being in the
eighth century A. D. (second/third centuries
A.H.) the movement that arose in Septimania.
This move-ment rejected the confession of sins
before priests, claiming that man should plead
only to God for re-mission of his wrongdoing.
Islam has neither priests nor monks nor rabbis,
and naturally it does not rec-ognize confession.
"Similarly
there arose a movement for the des-truction of
religious pictures and statues (the Icono-clasts).
In the eighth and ninth centuries A. D. (third
and fourth centuries A. H.) a Christian sect
came into being rejecting the sanctification of
pictures and sta-tues. The Roman Emperor Leo Ill
issued an order in 726 A.D. prohibiting pictures
and statues and pictures to be worshipped, and
another in 730 A. D. condemn-ing such worship as
idolatry. Similarly Constantine V and Leo IV
opposed statue worship, while Popes Gregory II
and III and Germanius, the patriarch of
Constantinople, and the Empress Irene supported
it. A bitter struggle took place between the two
factions, the details of which we cannot recount
here. We wish only to point out that some
historians regard the call for destruction of
images and statues to have been in-fluenced by
Islam. It is said that Claudius, the bishop of
Turenne (appointed in 828 A. D. /213 A. H.) who
burnt images and crosses and forbade their
worship in his diocese, was born and brought up
in Islamic Andalusia.
"There was also a
group of Christians who in-terrupted the concept
of the trinity in a more or less monotheistic
manner and denied the divinity of Christ".
When
the barbaric armies of the Crusaders re-turned
from the Islamic East in the eleventh century A.
D., they brought with them an image of the life of
Muslim society. Despite all the deviations that
had taken place in that society, the outstanding
charac-teristic that pervaded it - in contrast to
the barbaric Crusader lands - was the unity of the
law to which both ruler and ruled submitted, and
which did not de-rive from the will of an
aristocrat or the whims of feudal lords, as was
the case in Europe. There was, too, personal
liberty in the choice of work and place of
residence; private ownership and free disposition
of goods; absence of an hereditary class
structure; and the ability of the individual to
rise, by his own labor and efforts, to a higher
place in society at any time. A European living
under the feudal system had never before witnessed
these outstanding features, being as he was a
slave to the soil, his only law the will of his
master, and his class being determined by
heredity.
Thus
it was - in conjunction with other economic
factors in the life of European society - that
cries arose which gradually destroyed the feudal
system; proclaimed the liberation of the
individual from slavery to the soil, even if not
from other bonds, and even if European society was
not lifted to the level of Muslim society.
From
the universities of Andalusia; from the influence
of eastern Islamic Civilization which had become
an international civilization; from the European
translations of the Islamic legacy, there came
into being the European renaissance movement in
the fourteenth century and the subsequent periods.
There came into being also the new scientific
movement, in particular the experimental method.
Brifeld,
in his book "The Making of Humanity"
says:
"Science
was the most important contribution of Arab
civilization (It should be noted that western
writers are anxious to call Islamic civilization
by the name of Arab civilization. This is done
purposely for the name of Islam is distasteful
to them, and they wish too to restrict Islam to
the Arabs. The scone of Islam is however far
wider. They wish to stir up racial hatred within
the Islamic community) to the modern world, but
its fruits were slow in ripening. The genius
produced by Arab civilization in Spain did not
begin to bloom until many centuries after that
civilization had disappeared behind dark clouds,
and it was not science alone that revived
Europe. Many other effects of Islamic
civili-zation shed their rays of light on
Europe. Although there is not a particular
aspect of the European blos-soming whose origin
cannot safely be ascribed to the influence of
Islamic culture, these influences are found most
clearly and most significantly in that cap-acity
which has furnished the modern world with its
enduring and distinctive power: namely, the
natural sciences and the spirit of scientific
enquiry".
He
goes on to say:
"Our
science owes to that of the Arabs not amazing
discoveries or original theories, but something
much more Important - its own existence. The
ancient world, as we have seen, was one where
science was non-existent. Astronomy and
mathematics were for-eign sciences for the
Greeks, imported from abroad and borrowed from
outsiders, and never acclimatized, although
mixed into Greek culture. The Greeks codi-fied
its laws and laid down theories. But the methods
of conscientious investigation, the collection
and con-centration of positive data, the
analytical approach to science, precise and
continuous observation, experi-mental
investigation - all these were basically foreign
to the Greek mentality. That which we call
"science" appeared in Europe as the
outcome of a new spirit of investigation, fresh
avenues of research by means of experimentation
and observation, and as the result of a
development of mathematics to a stage unknown to
the Greeks. ... This spirit and these methods of
re-search were imported by the Arabs into the
European world" (ibid.).
He
says before this:
"Roger
Bacon studied Arabic and Arab science at Oxford
under the successors to the Arab scientists of
Andalusia. Neither Roger Bacon, nor his namesake
Francis Bacon who came after him, has the right
to be credited with the invention of the
experimental method. Roger Bacon was but one of
the messengers of the science and methodology of
the Muslims to Christian Europe. He never tired
of declaring that for his contemporaries to
learn the Arabic language and the Arab sciences
was the only way for acquiring true knowledge.
The discussion as to the inventor of the
experimental method is one example of the
distor-tion of the origins of European
civilization. The method of the Arabs had spread
widely during the time of Bacon, and everywhere
in Europe people were eager to learn it.
"Whence
did Roger Bacon derive his knowledge of the
sciences?
"From
the Islamic universities of Andalusia. The fifth
section of his book "Cepus Majus",
which is de-voted to a discussion of optics, is
in reality a copy Ibn Haytham's "al-Manazir".
Dreyber,
professor at New York University, says in his book
"The Struggle between Religion and
Science":
"Muslim
scientists became aware that intellectual,
theoretical methods do not lead to progress, and
that the hope of finding the truth must be
connected with an observation of events. Hence
their slogan in their researches came to be the
experimental method and the practical results of
sense-perception.
"The
results of this scientific movement appear
clearly in the brilliant progress of industry in
their era. We will be amazed to see in their
writings sci-entific theories which we thought
to be the product of our own age. Among these is
the doctrine of evolution of organic beings -
which is regarded as a modern doctrine - and was
taught in the Muslims' schools. They had taken
this doctrine further than we have done and
applied it to solids and minerals. (Caution must
be exercised with respect to this statement and
similar ones, made by western writers who make a
show of justice towards Islam and Islamic
thought. The doctrine of evolution as
established by Darwin and Wallace is different
from what was established by the scientific
investigations of the Muslims, who were not
fleeing from the church and the god of the
church. Muslim scientists observed the
graduation between the stages of creation. They
began with the attributes lowest degree of
vegetable life. The degrees of vege-table life
culminated in turn in the lowest degree of
animal' life, and hence life evolved. All this
they attributed to the will and activity of God.
Darwin however wished to deny the intervention
of any super-natural element in evolution. This
was because he was in flight from the church and
the god of the church in whose name science and
scientific investigation in general were
persecuted. By c9ntrast, the investi-gations of
the Muslims were not tainted with any dis-respect
for man, depriving him 6f any spiritual ele-ment
and discovering for him some bestial origin. The
Islamic theory states clearly that man was
crea-ted independently. if man sits at the
summit of the degrees of living beings, in
regard of the formation of his members and his
intellectual and spiritual capacities, this is
because God Almighty created Him as He created
all beings at the level where they exist. There
is, then, a great difference in the basis of the
theory, although the Muslims were the first to
pro-pound it). They applied chemistry in
medicine, and progressed so far in mechanics as
to be able to de-fine the laws of gravity. In
the theories of light and vision they were able
to change the opinion of the Greeks that vision
takes place by the emission of rays from the eye
to the object beheld; they established that the
opposite was true. They knew of the reflection
and refraction of rays. Hasan ibn al-Haytham dis-covered
the arc followed by rays of light on their
passage through the atmosphere, and proved at
the same time that we see the sun and moon
before they actually appear on the horizon, and
that we can still see them for a short time
after they set".
We
must content ourselves with these examples of the
influence of the Islamic path and the Islamic life
on the life of mankind and its history, and on the
major movements in the world history. They are
meant purely as an indication of that great,
many-sided truth which we so frequently forget.
When we behold the structure of contemporary
civilization, we imagine, in our simplicity and
ignorance, that we have no part in it, that we
have had no influence upon it; that it is
something greater than us and our history. Even
our own history is unknown to us; we hear it from
the mouths of our enemies whose only desire is to
fill our hearts with despair at the possibility of
an Islamic life, one in conformity with the path
of Islam. They derive advantage from our despair,
for it protects them from attack by us, attack in
order to wrest back the reins of world leadership.
What ails us that we absorb what they say, and
then repeat it like parrots or monkeys?
This
is not our subject here. We intend only to prepare
for an indication of the broad lines traced by the
first Islamic wave and well known to humanity.
Humanity too is today better able to comprehend
and imagine these, which constitute the new
resource, in addition to that already existing -
human nature.
TRACES
AND EFFECTS
When
the first hightide of Islam passed away; when
ignorance of divine guidance resumed its sway
after being deposed by Islam; when Satan shook the
dust of battle from his shoulders1 arose and
summoned his followers who again held the reins of
power - when all of this happened the life of
mankind did not return to the state it had been in
during the previous period of ignorance. Islam was
there, even if it had retreated from its position
of dominance in the world. It had left behind it
broad traces, significant principles that had
become established in human life and familiar to
pIIeople. They had lost the strangeness with which
they had first been received when proclaimed by
Islam. These broad traces and significant
principles we wish to indicate briefly in this
chapter.
ONE
HUMANITY
The
Arabian Peninsula was dominated by loyalty to the
tribe, the sub-tribe or even to the single family,
and the outside world by loyalty to country,
birthplace, color and race. Humanity was unable to
ima-gine any other kind of loyalty until Islam
came and proclaimed to everyone that humanity is
one, stems from the same source and is directed
towards the same God; that difference of race and
color, of father-land and ancestry exist not to
create division, en-mity and alienation among
humanity, but merely so that men might recognize
and identify each other; so that the tasks of the
viceregency of God on earth might be distributed
among them; and so that they might ultimately all
return to God who had placed them on earth as His
viceregents. God Almighty addressed them thus in
the Noble Qur'an:
"0
people, we have created you of male and fe-male,
and made of you peoples and tribes that you
might recognize each other. The most noble of
you in the sight of God is the most God-fearing
among you. Truly God is All-seeing,
All-wise" (al-Hujarat) v.13)
"0
people, fear your Lord who created you from a
single soul, and created from it its mate, and
scat-tered from these two numerous men and
women. Fear God by whom you demand of one
another, and the wombs. Surely God ever watches
over you" (al-Nisa, v.1)
"Among
His signs are the creation of heaven and earth
and the variation of your tongues and your
colors. Truly therein are signs for all the
worlds" (al-Rum, v.22).
These
were not theoretical principles, but prac-tical
situations. Islam expanded over a wide area of the
globe which embraced most races and colors, and
melted them all together in the order of Islam.
In-herited color, race, class or lineage did not
prevent all from living together as brothers, or
the individual from attaining what his
qualifications enabled him to, and his rank as
human being imposed upon him.
This
broad trace established itself in the world,
although initially strange to the world and
rejected by it. Even after the recession of the
first wave of Is-lam, it was unable to reject it
totally or to find it strange.
It
is true that humanity was unable to practice it
like the Muslim community, where too its
establish-ment was not complete.
It
is true that various minor loyalties and
fanaticism continue to exist: loyalties to the
fatherland, to race, nation, color and language.
It
is true that the position of people of color in
America and South Africa constitutes a serious and
obstinate problem, and in Europe too in a more
con-cealed manner.
Nonetheless,
the concept of a single humanity still is an
important element in the counsels of humanity
today. This concept, delineated by Islam, is the
root of all human thinking, from a theoretical
standpoint, while petty loyalties are vanishing
and diminishing, being weak and baseless.
The
first wave of Islam passed away, after
deline-ating this concept with the help of the
potentialities of human nature. But it left for
the following wave not only these potentialities,
but the resources it had it-self brought into
being. Humanity is better able to perceive and to
apply the message of Islam, and the element of
surprise and amazement has disappeared.
A
NOBLE HUMANITY
When
Islam first came, human dignity was res-tricted to
certain classes and families. As for the masses1
they were but scum, deprived of any dignity or
worth.
Islam
proclaimed with resonance the nobility of man as
deriving from his very humanity, not from some
incidental feature such as race, color, class,
riches or position. The real rights of man are
simi-larly derived from his humanity, which in
turn derives from a single origin.
God
says to man in the Quran:
"We
have ennobled the sons of Adam, carried them on
land and sea, nurtured them with lawful
enjoyment, and preferred them to much of our
creation" (al-Isr, v.70)
"When
your Lord said ~ the angels: I shall create a
viceregent on earth" (al-Baqara, v.30)
"When
we said to the angels: prostrate before Adam,
and they prostrated, all except Iblis who
re-fused. Truly he acted arrogantly and is of
the un-believers." (al-Baqara, v.34)
"And
He has subjected to you all that is in the
heavens and the earth, all together, from
Him:(al-Jathiya, v.13)
Thenceforth
people knew that man, by his very na-ture, was
noble in the sign of God, and that his no-bility
is inherent and independent of race, color,
country, nation, tribe and family, or any other
tri-vial and accidental feature. It depends only
on his being a man, on his belonging to the
species on which God has bestowed nobility.
These principles were not
theoretical, they were realistic and practical and
represented in the life of the Muslim community.
Through that community, they spread all over the
world, and were recognized by people who proceeded
to put them into practice. The masses, the
"scum", realized their nobility, that
they possessed rights, the rights of a human
being, they might demand reckoning of their
rulers' and princes, that they ought not to submit
to humiliation, debasement and insult. The rulers
and princes were taught that they enjoyed no
special rights denied to the masses, and that they
might not insult the nobility of one who was not a
prince or a ruler.
This
represented a new birth for man, a birth greater
than his first, material one. For what is man
without the dignity and rights of man? What is man
if those rights do not depend upon his very exist-ence
and true nature, which never vary?
Abu
Bakr - may God be content with him! - began his
caliphate saying: "I have been made ruler
over you, but am not the best of you. If I act
well, then help me. If I act badly, then correct
me. Obey me as long as I obey God and the Prophet.
If I disobey them, I may not claim your
obedience".
Umar
ibn al-Khattab - may God be content with him! -
addressed the people concerning their rights with
respect to their rulers as follows:
"0
people! I do not send governors to you to peal
the skins off you, nor to take your property
from you. I send them only to instruct you in
your faith and your path. Anyone who is
mistreated, let him refer it to me, and by Him
in whose hand is the soul of Umar, I will surely
avenge him".
Amr
ibn al-As jumped up and said:
"0
Commander of the Faithful! If it were one of the
amirs of Muslims who mistreated a non-Muslim
subject, would you still exact your vengeance
from him?"
Umar
replied:
"By
Him in Whose hand is the soul of Umar, indeed I
would take vengeance from him! How should I not
when I saw the Prophet of God - may the Peace
and Blessings of God be upon him! - taking
vengeance on his own self? Do not heat the
people, for that will humiliate them. Do not
separate them from their homes and families, for
that will tempt them to sedition. Do not deprive
them of their rights, for that will incline them
to unbelief".
Uthman
- may God be content with him! - wrote to all the
towns of the Muslim realm as follows:
"I
demand of my governors that they come to meet me
every year at the time of the pilgrimage. I have
been given rule over the community in order to
enjoin good and forbid evil. Let then no
imposition be made on anyone that I have not
authorized. Neither I nor my governors have any
rights over our people. It has been said in
Medina that a group of people have been insulted
and beaten. Whosoever makes such a claim, let
him come to me at the pilgrimage season, and his
due right shall be exacted either from me or
from my governors. Or forgive one another, for
God loves those who forgive one another".
The
important thing, as we have previously stated, is
that these were not purely theoretical principles
or words that were spoken. They were realistically
ap-plied, and gained currency among peoples as a
prac-tical rule of conduct.
There is for example the
well-known case of Ibn al-Qibti who engaged in a
race with the son of Amr ibn al-As, the conqueror
and governor of Egypt. When the son of Amr ibn
al-As won he beat his oppo-nent. His father
complained to Umar ibn al-Khattab, who then
avenged him in public during the season of the
pilgrimage.
Writers usually content
themselves with mention-ing the justice of Umar,
but the phenomenon indicates also the liberating
aspect of Islam for the minds and life on
humanity.
Egypt
was then a conquered country, newly con-verted to
Islam. Al-Qibti was still a Copt, one of the
masses of the conquered land. Amr ibn al-As was
conqueror of the region, and its first governor
for Islam. The rulers of the land before the
Islamic conquest were the Byzantines, whose whips
used con-stantly to descend on the backs of the
peoples of their colonies. Possibly the back of
that Copt still bore the traces of the whip of the
Byzantines.
But the wave of liberation
released by Islam in all parts of the earth made
the Copt forget the whip of the Byzantines and his
own humiliation. It made of him a free and
dignified human being, who was angered when the
son of the governor beat his son after racing with
him. His anger at the wounded dignity of his son
induced him to ride from Egypt to Madina, not
travel-ing by aeroplane, car, steamer or train,
but on camelback. He rode on for many long months
simply in order to complain to the Caliph, the
Caliph who had liberated him on the day when he
conquered his coun-try under the banner of Islam,
who had taught him human dignity which he had
forgotten beneath the whip of the Byzantines.
We
should then realize the profundity of the
libera-tion effected by Islam. It was not simply a
question of Umar being just, for his justice
cannot be invoked at all ages, but rather that the
justice of Umar, which was derived from the path
and system of Islam, had released a raging torrent
of liberation in the world which reestablished the
dignity of man.
It
is true that mankind never again attained this
high level, but this concept delineated by Islam,
of the dignity, freedom and rights of the human
being with respect to rulers and princes, left
undeniable traces in the life of mankind. It is in
part these traces that are impelling man to
declare the "rights of man".
It
is true that this declaration has not followed any
practical path in human life. It is true that men
in various parts of the globe are still meeting
with con-tempt, humiliation, torture and
deprivation It is true that some philosophies
reduce the status of man to something less than a
tool, a means, and kill his freedom, dignity and
higher qualities for the sake of increased
production and income and market supre-macy.
Despite all this, the concept delineated by Is-lam
still exists in the minds and imaginations of
man-kind. It is not strange as it was when Islam
first proclaimed it. Humanity is today better able
to understand and imagine it, if again confronted
with it in the coming wave of Islam, God willing.
A
SINGLE COMMUNITY
When
Islam first came, it found people banded together
on the basis of descent, race, homeland or common
interest and advantage. All these petty loyal-ties
had no bearing on the true nature and essence of
man; rather they were incidental attributes
attaching themselves to the noble essence of man.
Islam
spoke firmly and decisively concerning this
important matter, and defined the relations of
people to one another. It said: neither color, nor
race, nor lineage, nor homeland, nor shared
interests and ad-vantages shall join people
together or separate them; rather their belief,
their relationship to their Lord, shall determine
also their relationships to one an-other. It is
their relationship to God which bestows upon them
their humanity, and should determine their course
both in this world and the hereafter. The breath
that has come to them from the spirit of God has
made man into man; has given him dignity and
subjugated to him all that is in the heavens and
the earth. On this basis then people are united or
sepa-rated, not on the basis of any incidental
attribute that attaches itself to the essence of
man.
The
basis for association is belief, for belief is the
most noble attribute of the human spirit. If this
bond should disappear, there is no unity, and
indeed no existence. Humanity must associate on
the basis of its most noble attribute, not on the
basis of fodder, pasture, and enclosure like the
animals.
There
are all over the world two parties: that of God
and that of Satan. The party of God stands be-neath
the banner of God and bears His insignia. The
party of the Devil embraces every community,
group, people, race and individual who do not
stand under the banner of God.
The
umma (community) is the group of people bound
together by belief, which constitutes their
nationality. If there is no belief there is no
umma, for there is nothing to bind it together.
Land, race, lan-guage, lineage, common material
interests are not enough, either singly or in
combination, to form an umma, unless the bond of
belief is in existence.
The
bond must be an idea that vivifies heart and mind,
a concept that interprets being and life, joins to
God, by a breath from whose soul man became man,
was distinguished from the beasts, and set aside
in a God-given dignity.
God says in the Qur'an,
addressing the believers of every land, age, race,
throughout the centuries, speaking through Noah -
upon him be Peace! - to Muhammad - Peace and
Blessings be upon him! -
This
your community is a single community, and I am
your Lord, so worship Me. (al-Anbiya, v.92)
God
distinguished between people on the basis of
belief, irrespective of ties of ancestry, race or
homeland between them. He said:
"Thou
shalt not find any people who believe in God and
the Last Day who are loving to anyone who
opposes God and His Messenger, not though they
were their fathers, or their sons, or their
brothers or their clan. Those -He has written
faith upon their hearts, and He has confirmed
them with a spirit from Himself; and He shall
admit them into gardens underneath which rivers
flow, therein to dwell forever, God being
well-pleased with them, and they well-pleased
with Him. Those are God's party; why, surely
God's party, they are the prosperers" (al-Mujadala,
v.22)
He
has established only one cause for killing -when
there is no other recourse - and that is striving
for the sake of God (Jihad). He has defined the
aim of the believer and the aim of the
non-believer in a clear and decisive manner:
"Those
who believe fight for thesake of God. And those
who disbelieve fight for the sake of idols.
Fight then the followers of Satan, surely the
guild of Satan is but feeble" (al-Nisa,
v.76)
It
appeared strange to all humanity at that time that
association should be on the basis of belief, not
race, color, commerce, or any secondary,
incidental characteristic.
This
"sectarianship", to use the present-day
expression, was strange when first introduced by
Islam, but today we see humanity absorbing it, and
associat-ing different fatherlands, peoples,
languages, colors and races on the basis of
belief.
It
is true that they do not associate on the basis of
belief in God, but on the basis of economic or
social beliefs, humanity being in the low state
that it is. Secondary factors appear to it as more
important than a single great truth. But at any
event it recognizes that the principle of
association can be belief, can be a spiritual or
intellectual bond! This represents an advance.
It
remains now for humanity to rise towards
some-thing nobler and loftier, to proceed on the
ascent to-wards the sublime summit, under the
guidance of Is-lam in its coming wave. It will
have at its disposal old and new resources; those
of human nature, and the experiences passed
through by mankind since-the first wave of Islam.
However, when Islam came to
associate people on the basis of belief, and made
of it the principle for unity or separation, it
did not make of reluctance to believe a reason for
hostility. It did not allow intol-erance to
determine its relations with those who did not
embrace its belief or associate on its basis.
God
imposed the duty of jihad on the Muslims not so
that they might force people to embrace Islam, but
rather so that they might erect on earth its
righteous, just and sublime system. People might
choose the belief they wished in the protective
shadow of this system, which embraced both Muslim
and non-Muslim in perfect justice.
"There
is no compulsion in religion, truth has be-come
clear from error. Whosoever disbelieves in idols
and believes in God, truly he has laid hold of
hold of the firm link which sunders not. God is
All-hearing, All-knowing" (al-Baqara, 256)
The
lands ruled by the system of Islam and govern-ed
according to the Law of Islam are regarded as the
"Realm of Islam" (Dar al-Islam),
irrespective of whether their inhabitants have all
embraced the faith or some of them follow other
religions. The lands not ruled by the system of
Islam and not governed according to the Law of
Islam constitute the "Realm of War" (Dar
aI-Harb), whatever their inhabitants may be.
Relations
between the Realm of Islam and the Realm of War
have not been neglected but are pre-cisely and
systematically defined, in accordance with good
character, purity and righteousness.
If
the Realm of Islam is bound by treaty and agree-ment
to the Realm of War, then that treaty and agree-ment
must be observed, deceit and treachery not be-ing
permitted, and abrogation and surprise attack
being forbidden. Unless, of course, the period of
the treaty runs out or it is broken by the people
of the Realm of War.
If
there is a truce without any specific period, then
it must be observed, abrogation being permitted if
treachery is feared on the part of the Realm of
War. Then the end of the truce must be openly
proclaimed.
If
war should take place, there are rules and
regu-lations to be observed in regard to it. If
the enemy should incline to peace, by signing a
treaty, paying the poll-tax and submitting to the
Islamic system, while maintaining freedom of
belief, he has the right to demand this of the
Muslims.
Surely
the worst of beasts in God's sight are the
unbelievers who will not believe, those of them
with whom thou hast made compact then they break
their compact every time, not being godfearing.
So, if thou comest upon them anywhere in the
war, deal with them in such wise as to scatter
the ones behind them; haply they will remember.
And if thou fearest treachery anyway at the
hands of a people, dissolve it equally; surely
God loves not the treacherous. And thou are not
to suppose that they who disbelieve have
outstripped Me; they cannot frustrate My will.
Make ready for them whatever force and strings
of horses you can, to terrify thereby the enemy
of God and your enemy, and others beside them
that you know not; God knows them. And
whatsoever you expend in the way of God shall be
repaid you in full; you will not be wronged. And
if they incline to peace, do thou incline to it;
and put thy trust in God; He is the All-hearing,
the All-knowing.(al-Anfal, vv. 55-61)
God
also laid emphasis on faithfulness to treaties,
rejecting "interest of the state" as a
justification for breaking undertakings:
"Fulfill
God's covenant, when you make covenant, and
break not the oaths after they have been
con-firmed, and you have made God your surety;
surely God knows the things you do. And be not
as a woman who breaks her thread, after ~t is
firmly spun, into fibers, by taking your oaths
as mere mutual deceit, one nation being more
numerous than another nation. God only tries you
thereby; and certainly He will make clear to you
upon the Day of Resurrection that where-on you
were at variance". (al-NahI, vv. 91-92)
If
war takes place, then the honor of none is to be
ravished; children, the aged and women are not to
be killed; crops are not to be burnt; cattle are
not to be destroyed; retaliation is not permitted;
only those bearing arms against the Muslims may be
attacked.
These
are the instructions given by Abu Bakr to the army
of Usama as he was on his way to do battle against
the Byzantines:
Do
not practise treachery, do not be excessive in
your dealings, do not betray, do not retaliate,
do not kill children or the aged or women. Do
not cut down or burn palm-trees or any
fruit-trees. Do not slaugh-ter camels except for
food. You will encounter men who have isolated
themselves in calls. Leave them to themselves,
and pass on your way in the name of God".
I
do not intend here to go exhaustively into the
laws regulating dealings between the Realm of
Islam and the Realm of War, and those between
Muslims and non-Muslims. The present treatise is
not the place for such a discussion. I wish only
to point out the broad line established by Islam
on this earth for the relations between opposing
camps, whereas before it there existed no such
rules. Before Islam, different communities
interacted only with the sword or the law of
intolerance. Everything was permitted to the
strong, and the defeated enjoyed no rights at all.
These rules delineated by
Islam did not disappear or vanish from the life of
humanity. From the seven-teenth century A. D.
(eleventh century A. H.) onwards, the world began
to establish its mutual intercourse on the basis
of these rules. It began to move towards the
concept of "international law" and to
erect inter-national bodies for its strengthening
in the nineteenth century A.D. These bodies have
enjoyed varying success and failure up to the
present, and consider-able discussion has been
devoted to the subject of in-ternational law.
Hence
the system introduced by Islam is not as strange
to humanity as it was when it first appeared. It
is true that humanity has not attained the same
ethi-cal level reached by the early Muslim
community in cooperation and intercourse with
other communities. It is also true that serious
setbacks have taken place in this century with
regard to the theories of inter-national law
evolved by western jurisprudence. The principle of
the declaration of war and the prohibition of the
abrogation of treaties have been abolished.
Assassination
has become more common among men than killing
among beasts of the desert.
It
is further true that the motives behind war and
peace are still advantage and plunder, booty and
mar-kets, and are far below the belief, doctrine,
virtue and justice envisaged by Islam as the aim
of jihad.
Nonetheless,
the concept of international relations being based
on a law known to all parties concerned still
exists. It was first brought into being by Islam,
and that sublime and righteous path, ordained for
hu-manity by God, gave it practical effect in the
life of men.
If
again men are summoned to this path, this con-cept
will not appear unfamiliar or reprehensible to
them. Its sublime ethical foundation may be
unknown to mankind as it flounders in the swamp of
ignorance of divine guidance, but the concept
itself is neither unfamiliar nor reprehensible.
Islam,
which at first relied only on the potential of
human nature in establishing its principles, will
in its next wave of activity draw too on the
familiarity of mankind with certain of its
principles. It will draw too on the various
experiences undergone by mankind. And, God
willing, it will thereby be better enabled to
begin again its forward march.
FINALLY...
In
this brief discussion, we cannot deal in greater
detail with the concepts and traces left by Islam
in the life, history and present state of
humanity, traces which were not there before Islam
and which have re-mained obstinately in place1
however distorted or blunted, and however distant
they may be from the lofty summit to which people
attained by following the sublime and righteous
path of divine origin.
These
few examples we have indicated serve to give some
idea of the tens of traces and effects left behind
by that path. There are many analogous ones to be
found over the space of fourteen hundred years.
A
final word must be said at the end of this
dis-cussion, so that those who summon men to God
and His path may not be dazzled by the existence
of these favorable factors, and forget to provide
for the obstacles and barriers that confront them
in their task.
This
word must concern opposing factors, the obstinate
barriers in one? 5 path.
Mankind
in its entirety is today more distant from God
than it used to be.
The
clouds which weigh over man's nature are thicker
and denser than before. The previous ignor-ance of
God was based on a general ignorance, sim-plicity
and primitiveness. That of the present is based on
learning, complexity and frivolity.
Men
were completely dazzled by the conquests of
science in the eighteenth and nineteenth
centuries. The flight from the church and the god
of the church, in whose name thinkers and men of
learning were burnt or persecuted, was a mad and
panic flight that stopped at nothing sacred.
It
is true that science itself, from the beginning of
the present century, has begun to lead the great
sci-entists back towards God. Human nature, made
wretched by its wandering in the desert, has begun
to weary and to return to God. But the dazzlement
re-mains, and this century will end before the
wandering section of humanity begins its return
from the wastes of godlessness.
The
area and scope of worldly life has increased in
the feelings and beings of people. It has extended
thus because of the means of luxury and comfort
pro-duced by modern civilization, and people have
come to sense the vastness and weight of worldly
life. Science, culture and the arts have added
whole new areas to the feelings and life of men.
If
all this had arisen on the basis of knowledge of
God, of the attributes of divinity and those of
human-ity in relation to God; on the basis of the
profound truth that God has appointed man as His
vice regent on earth, has subordinated to him all
the earth contains, and equipped him with all
necessary talents and gifts; that man is in all
this being tested for the hereafter -it it had
arisen on this healthy foundation, the new areas
added to the perception and life of men by
sci-ence and civilization, would have been areas
added too to religious belief, bringing men closer
to God and His path of righteousness, namely
Islam.
But
all this arose on a basis of flight from the
tyr-annical church and a god in whose name it
oppressed mankind. So it was an area added to
man1s distance from God, an obstacle in the path
to Him, one which must be taken into account by
those who summon men to Islam.
It
is true that mankind is wretched and is tired of
bearing the burden of its materialistic
civilization and luxury. It is true that
corruption and dissolution, nervous and mental
disease, intellectual and sexual perversion are
eating away the body of western civi-lization,
destroying nations and individuals, and are
forcibly opening people's eyes to evil and
corruption.
However,
humanity persists in its bestial excite-ment, its
lunatic intoxication, its uproar and confu-sion.
The present century will pass away before eyes are
fully opened, brains are cleared of their
intoxication, and humanity recovers from its daze.
The
first states of ignorance of divine guidance were
connected to the primitiveness of nomadic life,
which doubtless had its influence upon them. The
traditions and customs of nomadism to a large
extent determined people's conduct. Even though
these made of the conflict' between those calling
for Islam and those ignorant of divine guidance a
harsh and violent contest, nonetheless it was a
clear and explicit one. Human nature was able to
respond clearly, from be-hind the clouds of
obstinacy and arrogance; both be-lief and
disbelief were clearly defined. All of this was
better than flexibility, indifference and
frivolity.
Humanity
is today suffering from frivolity and
in-difference with regard to all beliefs,
ideologies and doctrines. It is also suffering
from hypocrisy, deceit and baseness. All of these
are barriers on the path of summoning men to God
and obstacles in the way of righteously pursuing
the path of God.
We
should not neglect or underestimate these and many
similar matters, so that workers for Islam should
not be dazzled by favorable factors and fail to
equip themselves adequately.
How
may they equip themselves? There is only one thing
with which they may provide themselves: fear of
God, consciousness of the reality of God, di-rect
cooperation with God, and absolute trust in His
explicit promise: 'The victory of the believers is
a duty incumbent upon Us1' (al-Rum, v.48)
What
is required is that a believing group place their
hands in the hands of God and then march forth,
the promise of God to them being the overriding
real-ity for them, and the pleasure of God being
their first and last aim.
Through this group God's way
for the realization of His path will be applied.
It will disperse the clouds of ignorance from
human nature. It will give ex-pression to the will
of God that His word be supreme on earth, and the
reins of power be in the hands of His faith:
Many
paths and institutions have passed away he-fore
you; journey in the land, and behold how was the
end of those that cried lies. This is an
exposition for mankind, and a guidance, and an
admonition for such as are god-fearing. Faint
not, neither sorrow; you shall be supreme if you
are believers. If a wound touches you, a like
wound has already touched the heathen; such days
we deal out in turn among men, that God may know
who are the believers and that He may take
witnesses from among you. Truly God loves not
the evildoers - and that God may test the
believers and blot out the unbelievers".
(Al-Imran, vv. 137-141)
