Islam is most often invoked for justifying acts of terror by certain political outfits drawing a picture as if they are the only ‘true’ followers of Islam and those who are against their acts of violence have abandoned their path. In fact, these groups for their goals try to create an atmosphere of terror, which ultimately help them in realising their goal. Most of these groups claim to be the revivalists. The present essay tries to question their idea of revivalism; to which Islam they try to restore; the one which was nourished by the Rashidun Caliphs or the one which Kharajites wanted or the one of Ummaiyyads or the Abbasids. This essay also seeks to show historically, that whatever the political Islam or the orthodoxy preached or expected from the umma, they always faced stiff resistance from an individual or a group from within the community.
Abduction
of Nigerian schoolgirls by Boko Haram and developments since then has shocked
the world. World leaders have pledged to help the Nigerian government in
locating and liberating them. Recently a tape was released by the Islamist
terror outfit, Boko Haram which says that they might sell the girls in slave
market. What is shocking is that they invoked names and symbols of religion for
justifying their inhuman action. They said that the Western education is sin
and the girls should get married as soon they turn twelve.
Since
insurgency began, the Boko Haram has carried out attacks on schools, students
and teachers in a bid to create a strict Islamic state in the Muslim north of
Nigeria. Their targets are mostly schools imparting Western education, which
they think is a hurdle in their aim of making the Nigerian north an Islamic
state. The group leads a nativist movement based on tribal alignments and
rivalries. The group has been responsible for several killings in the region
including government officials, students, teachers and Muslim clerics who
oppose their activities. Similar
Christian militant group, Niger Delta is active in oil rich Niger delta
(Southern Nigeria) and demanding an independent South Nigeria. Clash between these
two have claimed several lives in the past. Whatever their political movement
means to achieve is not our concern, our concern is their way of realising
their goals.
 |
| Photo: thejournal.ie |
Islamic God, whatever He had to say has already
revealed in His Book, the Holy Quran and He is not in contact with any Boko
Haram leader (as the recent video sent by their leader claims) and ordering him
to stop people from going to schools or condemning the girls to death or
slavery. Islamic politics (I would prefer, Arab politics of different shades),
one may argue, have always been aggressive and this very aggression had led the
Arabs successfully conquer regions upto Spain. But the voices of dissent from
within the community (umma) have always been there against Arbo-Islamic
politics.
The third Caliph, Othman (r.644-656) was
murdered by a dissenting group. He was charged with favouring people of his own
clan in political and government appointments. He was also blamed for not properly
distributing the income from Swat region among the people of Medina. It was
said that Othman’s rule was not according to the Quranic principle of
governance and hence his murder/killing was justified and needed no revenge. This
argument convinced Ali (d. 661) the fourth Caliph, who was raised to the post
by these dissenting groups. Later on, Ali waged war against the Prophet’s
youngest wife, Ayesha and captured her for her opposition to his elevation as Caliph.
When Ali agreed to resolve the dispute between him and Muawiya by a treaty, he
too was charged with incompetence and later murdered by a group of people known
as Kharajites. All these political events made a large number of ordinary
Muslims uneasy and though, they accepted Muawiya as the political authority; at
the same time they rejected the religious leadership of Muawiya and his
successors. Murders of Husayn and his associates at Karbala was a shattering
event for the common Muslims. Frustrated commoners turned towards the people
who preached love and advocated personal relations to God, the Sufis, who
raised their voices individually. But with the dynastic and autocratic
evolution of Caliphate these individuals started gaining influence among the
masses. Mansur al Hallaj (858-922 CE) preached personal relations with God
above any religious rituals; in doing so he said that the ultimate goal is to
dissolve oneself into the presence of God. He used to say that, “If you do not
recognize God, at least recognize His sign, I am the creative truth —Ana
al-Haqq—, because through the truth, I am eternal truth.” He represented the stage of baqa of
Sufism as propounded by Ali Hajveri. For Al Hallaj, "Love means to stand
next to the Beloved, renouncing oneself entirely and transforming oneself in
accordance to Him." (Massignon, 74) He spoke of God as his "Beloved",
"Friend" "You," and felt that "his only self was God,"
to the point that he could not even remember his own name." (Mason, 26) His
ideas were against the Caliphal state and for them it represented chaos against
the order of God. Therefore, he was accused of heresy and after a trial of 11
years, he was executed. The martyrdom of Mansur al Hallaj was held in high
esteem by the contemporary and near contemporary poets and sufis. Farid ud Din
Attar (1145-1221 CE) says that when they were taking al Hallaj to court, a Sufi
asked him, “Whati is love?” He answered, “You will see it today, tomorrow and the day after
tomorrow." They killed him that day, burned him the next day and threw his
ashes to the wind the day after that. "This is love," Attar says. His
legs were cut off, he smiled and said, "I used to walk the earth with
these legs, now there's only one step to heaven, cut that if you can." For
Muslims, Al Hallaj, even today is a celebrated Martyr. His martyrdom is
exemplary for spiritual masters as well as common Muslims even today. Faiz
Ahmad Faiz (d.1984) exploits that sentiment when he says:
Bas Naam rahay ga Allah ka
Jo Ghayab Bhi hai Hazir Bhi
Jo Ghayab Bhi hai Hazir Bhi
Jo nazir bhi hai manzar bhi
(Then only God's name will remain
Who is both absent and present
Who is both the observer and the
view itself)
Uthay ga Analhaq ka Naara
Jo Main bhi Hun aur Tumbhi ho
(When the anthem of ‘I am the
Truth’ will be raised
Who I am and you are as well)
Aur Raaj karay gi khalq-e-Khuda
Jo main bhi hun aur tum bhi ho
Jo main bhi hun aur tum bhi ho
(And the people of God will reign
Who I am and you are as well)
Faiz invoked the
utterance of Anal Haque (I am the Truth/God) by Mansur al Hallaj, which
had become a symbol of revolt/resistance in Muslim societies to remind that it
is not new for us to revolt against the established orders (in his other poem na
unki rasm nayee hai na apni reet nayee).
Islam
was understood
to be a religion of Arabs and they treated their subjects, even if they were
Muslims, differently. The non-Arabs were organized in patron-client
relationship with the existing Arab tribes. These non-Arabs were called the maula
(pl. mawali) or slave of the Arab tribe which they were tied
to for politico-social reasons. Dissenting Arab groups such as the Kharajites (khariji)
were against this system in their early phase of existence and talked of unity
of the ‘umma. But later on they too changed their position with the
beginning of Mawali Movement, which is well-known for their opposition to the
Arab supremacy. Abbas Saffa exploited the mawali sentiment against the
Arabs and with their help the Ummaiyad rule thrown out and the ‘Abbasid
Revolution’ took place, which introduced completely a new system of state
modeled on erstwhile Sassanid’s with some modifications. The Abbasids too
betrayed the non-Arab cause and introduced regressive Arabisation of society,
state and culture. The non-Arab Muslims, particularly Persians resisted this
move with full vigor and they started Shubbiya Movement (shubbiya derived from shub,
Arab., nation) to keep their Persian language and identity intact. The movement
extolled the “Wisdom” of non-Arabs, the Indians, the Greeks, and especially the
Iranians in contrast to the lack of culture of the Arabs. The psyche of the
Persians can be understood in the words of a Persian commander as related to by
Firdausi (c. 1010) of Shahnama fame:
From mere drinkers of camel’s milk and lizard-eaters,
The Arabs have reached such a state
That they are aiming at the Iranian imperial throne
Fie upon thee, fie, O ever-turning Fortune!
In
response to the Persian criticism of Arab racism in Islam and politics, the
Arabs emphasized that they were the ‘first to produce Islam’ (Irfan Habib
2013). This kind of common Arab attitude and their notion of Islam, which
emphasized on the reward in afterlife for obeying God in this world, did not
impress more cultured Persians; to them it was a selfish motive. The response
to this notion, Rabia of Basra (d.801 CE) gave the idea of ‘disinterested love’
for God. She is reported to have said that, “I am going to light a fire in
paradise and pour water in hell, so that the servants of God can see him
without any object of Hope or motive of fear.” Rabia is much celebrated women
sufi, who has been referred to by several sufis as example for their own
teachings. One such example is narrated by Shaikh Nasiruddin Chiragh of Delhi
(d. 1356) about her:
“Rabia of Basra possessed much beauty and grace.
The principal men of Basra, consisting of scholars and mystics resolved
unanimously that this woman, while traversing the path of God, was not to
behave like men; it might not happen that Satan led her astray. Thereupon they
assembled together and went to Rabia. They told her, a woman however pious must
have a husband. She asked the most learned of them to come forward. Upon Khwaja
Hasan Basri doing so, she asked him: How was wisdom (aql) divided, at
Creation? He replied, “Nine parts were given to men, one to women”. And how, she went on, was
lust (shahwat) divided. He said, contrary
to that, nine parts of it were given to women, and just one to men. Rabia
thereupon countered: One-tenth of wisdom that I possess prevails over
nine-tenth of lust that I have got, while the nine-tenths of wisdom that you
people have cannot prevail over just one-tenth of lust!” (Hamid Qalandar. 1959,
200-201 c.f. Irfan Habib. 2013)
Rabia’s story, here, became the voice for
challenging inherent patriarchy in the Muslim societies, perhaps, of Delhi if
not of Basra. Although, Razia Sultan almost a century ago had challenged the
patriarchal nobility by becoming an independent Sultan with the help of common
Muslims, to whom she requested for help after Friday prayers in Delhi, but
unfortunately, she could not hold her position in a hostile environment for
long. It was perhaps Razia, who caused the beginning of the debate around
patriarchy among the Muslim elites of Delhi.
Exposition of Sharia law in itself is a story
of different politico-intellectual conflicts prevalent in the early umma (Muslim
brotherhood). The succession of early
caliphs depended on claimant’s nearness to the Prophet and his piety as
described by the companions (of the Prophet). By the time Marwanid Ummaiyads
came to power, no one from the companions was alive, therefore the caliphs
started patronizing writing of Hadith (traditions), which was related through a
chain of proofs. The Quran and the Hadith became the basis of Islamic law and
its interpretation became a leading science to be studied. Intellectual pursuit
of this kind was also accompanied with philosophical studies. Soon after the
conquest of Syria the Arabs started translating Hellenistic literatures into
Arabic. These translations crept into the philosophical understanding of the
Arabs and influenced religious thought as well. Mutazallite movement is an
example of these influences on Islamic thought, which not only tried to
understand the cosmology of Islam with reasons but also challenged very basic
belief system. They said that the Quran is a part of creature and like any
other creature of God has a life-span, thus the Quran can also become
irrelevant in future. For some time the Mutazallites had a great influence over
some of the caliphs who also unleashed mihna (inquisition) on the people
who refused to accept the Mutazallite view.
These
influences were not restricted to religious philosophy and theology but it
influenced many individuals who did not hesitate in recording their dissent
against established orders. Muqaddasi, one of great geographers of Islam, while
writing in c. 985 wonders, whether it would not ‘have been better if the
vast sums of money spent on mosques had been spent on roads and carvanserais
(rest-houses) and frontier fortresses’ (Irfan Habib. 2013). Abu Raihan Alberuni, the writer of Kitab
ul Hind (c. 1035) is well-known for his open mindedness and liberal
attitude is very frank in asserting that “To offer to him who has beaten your cheek,
the other cheek, also to bless your enemy and to pray for him: Upon my life,
this is a noble philosophy.” It is impossible that Alberuni was unaware of that
this is not what Muslim theology preaches. His admiration of Bhagvatgita and
Vyasa is an exemplary in itself.
The brief survey of history,
which I intentionally kept restricted to first five centuries of Islam,
narrates the stories of Arabo-Islamic politics and commoners’ response to it.
The driving force of Islam, as it is preached, was its emphasis on
egalitarianism atleast, among the umma. But, throughout the period of
caliphate one notices, the principle hardly been followed. However, it is quite
interesting to see that the orthodoxy always faced challenge from one quarter
or the other. In the present scenario of Nigerian crisis and their likes, one
has to resist and come out against their design to take the society backward.
The history remembers those who resist against tyranny.
Na unki rasm nayee hai na
apni reet nayee!
References
Massignon,
Louis (1983).
"Perspective Transhistorique sur la vie de Hallaj". Parole donnée (Paris: Seuil): 73–97.
Mason, Herbert (1983). Memoir of a Friend:
Louis Massignon. Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press
IRFAN HABIB (2013). “Questionings within Religious Thought:
The Experience of Islam”,
K. M. Ashraf Memorial Lecture at Kirori Mal College, University of Delhi in
2013.