Shahnawaz Farooqui - Articles Translated into English


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In the English Section, we will provide translations of articles written by Shahnawaz Farooqui.

Conflict, Cooperation and Detachment
Translated By: Farrukh Kamrani

The eternal relationship between religion and the world is that religion transforms the world without getting effected from it. For if religion were to adapt itself to the worldly demands, there would be no need for it. According to the belief of the Muslims, Islam is the last message of the God. There is no divine book which has not forecasted the arrival of the Prophet Muhammad (Peace be upon him). Even in the religious books of Hinduism, Buddhism and Zoroastrianism there are very clear predictions about the Prophet's emergence at more than one place. In the religious texts of Hindus, the word 'Maha-mad' is found as a Sanskrit approximation of 'Muhammad', the name of the Holy Prophet.

However whether they be the commonly held 'People of the Book', i.e., Jews and Christians, or the followers of the other religions, they do not recognize this 'place' of Islam. A conflict, therefore, has been continuously going on between Muslims and the upholders of other religions for the last many centuries. And now the so-called secular and liberal forces have also joined the rest, demanding that Muslims must forsake that interpretation of their religion that insists that Islam can not cooperate with any thing that is not consistent with it and that it has been sent to dominate. Now even among the Muslims there is no scarcity of people, who uphold more or less the same point of view. It means that in this regard 'the belief' and 'disbelief' have ceased to have any difference and that 'the belief' has learned to speak in the language of 'disbelief'.

If we see Islam in the context of its history, Muslims, while confronting great powers or challenges, can react only in three possible ways; (1) Conflict (2) Cooperation and (3) Detachment. Unfortunately the majority of the Muslims are unable to understand the real foundations of all the three attitudes according to the spirit of Islam. The foundations of the attitudes signify that conflicts must not be based on sentimentality, cooperation must not be for the sake of interests and that detachment must not be founded on apathy. The logic of this is evident.

In Islam the principle of Jihad is a completely transcendental principle. In some traditions of the Holy Prophet (Peace be upon him) it has been set forth that who so ever does jihad for national or communal pride, will not be getting any 'Ajr' or 'heavenly reward'. The person who does Jihad for being called brave will also remain unrewarded. So will he also be with out recompense, who undertakes it for worldly benefits and booty.

According to the delicacy of the situation cooperation could be attempted at. However behind this cooperation, there should not be any intention of gaining worldly benefits, as such intention changes the whole meaning and direction of cooperation.

It is possible to have some people in the society, who detach themselves from the struggle; however behind this detachment, the reason should be to be better able to serve Islam and Muslims. However if it is based on apathy then such detachment becomes censurable. When Britain occupied India, all the three modes of reaction got manifested. Some people think that every expression of the Jihad and War of Independence was based on sentimentality. However this was not the case as it was proved by the conditions that emerged after the war. On the surface all the Jihadi and resistance movements continued to fail, however these movements saved the spirit of jihad and resistance to be completely extinguished. Had it not been for these movements, we could not have even dreamt of Pakistan-its creation being still more preposterous thing.

Sir Syed raised the slogan of cooperation but he set its foundation on safeguarding (communal) interests, in spite of the fact that cooperation means nothing but peaceful co-existence. However Sir Syed's flowers' of cooperation blossomed on the garden of interest, resulting in the transforming of the psyche of cooperation into the psyche of slavery.

In that era we find some Ulmas and Sofias, who seemed to stand outside the field of struggle. However most of the people were those who, plunging deep down into the depths of our tradition, were endeavoring to make the Muslims more enriched in the domains of knowledge and spirituality. As it is evident, such detachment is not a detachment in the real sense. However even in those days there were some people who embraced apathy in the name of knowledge and Sufism.

These structures of action and reaction are still available to the Muslims. If somebody thinks that we should not get into confrontation with the West then he must establish cooperation in its true sense. If somebody wants to stay out of the conflict he should present his contributions in the realms of knowledge and spirituality to the Muslims. And if these are not the cases then what else can then be done except to fight and without doubt the principle of conflict in Islam is not personal.

Modernity and Retreat of Hinduism
Translated By: Farrukh Kamrani

In an article published in the Indian Express, the famous Indian Film Director, Mahesh Bhutt wrote that it was satisfactory to see that about nudity and obscenity all the Indian society now thought the same way as he had thought some two-three decades before. He said that twenty year back one of his films had been rejected by the Indian Censor Board for obscenity and the head of the Board had said that the film negated Indian values. However, he rejoiced, the advancement in technology had solved the problem. Now internet was available in every house and the world market for pornography was worth more than twenty billion dollar. He contended that in India there was no point in objecting to obscenity as there the history of nudity was very old.

A year or so back, I also came across a TV discussion on homosexuality, in which a single homosexual seemed loud enough to quiet down sixty to seventy adherents of 'normal' sexual behavior.

In India, extremism is on the rise and the common perception is that its roots lie in Hinduism. The BJP also beats the drum for Hinduism. However the fact is that in India, the Hinduism and its spirit have beaten a retreat before modernity and Hindu society's 'conviction' on Indian values is dwindling.

In the above referred discussion some people 'mentioned' of Hinduism; however they could not say any fundamental thing about it as they were not aware of it themselves. The things that Mahesh Bhutt said are his very old ideas, which always produce a lot of controversy but no 'reply' from any quarter. Some years back the famous Indian artist M. F. Hessian made a few paintings of the Indian gods and goddesses. The BJP, declaring these paintings obscene, destroyed them. The real 'obscenity' of those paintings however lied in their being made by a man whose name is like that of Muslims. For otherwise such type of paintings can be found any where in India.

The problem, which comes to light on the analysis of the situation, is that while Hinduism rejects one aspect of modernity, it, in some other sphere of life, embraces some other aspect of it. This results in the splitting of consciousness into two parts, each of which starts working independently according to its respective needs without any contact with each other. In the normal situations this 'disease' does not show its symptoms; but as soon as some moral issue emerges the reality becomes apparent. The thing that Mahesh Bhutt shows great satisfaction on will tear down the fabric of the Indian society. The Hindu community of India has been in the romance of modernity for the last two hundred years. The experience of modernity has however started only lately and from the very beginning this experience seems horrible. The satisfaction of Mahesh Butt is a testimony in this regard.

Clash of Civilizations
Translated By: Hafsa Ahsan

There are many people who consider this entire debate of the clash of civilizations in a very vague manner. They simply take it as face value and use weird analogies to explain it. Well, there is nothing wrong with that. After all, Quaid-e-Azam also used the cow to explain the two-nation theory. He said that the Hindus consider a cow to be their goddess while Muslims slaughter cows as a religious obligation.

But clash of civilizations is a phenomenon which merits a much deeper study and insight than that. It requires an in-depth study of the foundation and characteristics of different civilizations. And once someone masters the very basics of every civilization, he/she will be able to remove any misunderstandings and handle any arguments that are made in this regard. Islam enjoins on a person to learn and understand the principles of everything.

Whether we talk about an Islamic civilization, Christian civilization, Hindu civilization or modern, Western civilization, there are four basic principles which are common to each of them. No civilization can ever advance if it doesn’t have any of these four characteristics, which are as follows:

1) Principle of Ontology: According to this principle, neither man nor a civilization can be bereft of the concept of a being which is larger than they are. Those people who believe in God have their own belief. Those who do not also have their own ontological principles. For instance, Muslims believe in the Oneness of Allah (SWT). Christians have their belief rooted in the concept of “the God, the Son and the Holy Spirit.” In modern, Western civilization, it is capital which reigns supreme. Hence, in strictly academic terms we can conclude that while Islamic civilization is based upon the ontological principle of super naturalism, the modern Western civilization is based on naturalism.

These two principles are totally contradictory to each other. There is no way one can reconcile these principles to produce a middle way. Of course there is no dearth of people who claim that that it is very possible to produce a middle way and that the clash of civilizations is merely a myth. But if you really think about it, you’ll realize that even if these people do manage to invent some form of reconciliatory principle which combines the fundamental principles of each of them, how authentic will such a principle be? Most probably, the historians will have to re-write the entire history of Islam and the Muslims. Islamic scholars and thinkers like Maulana Maududi and Allama Iqbal will have to be debriefed.

Allama Iqbal is one person whose poems speak volumes about the modern West, modern Western civilization and the present civilization. If some reconciliatory principle is invented, it would seem that Iqbal totally wasted his time. After all, why couldn’t he come to terms with the fact that civilizations never clash? They are totally in harmony with one another. Clashes are totally rejected by every civilization.

And where Maulana Maududi is concerned, the entire content of all his books whether it is “Birth Control,” or “Purdah” speaks out about modern, Western civilization. It would seem that even he was misled then into thinking that the word civilization should be used for the modern West.

2) Principle of Epistemology: This principle states that every civilization has some form of knowledge. That knowledge may be incomplete, vague or incorrect, but it is there in the first place. The essential question which this principle puts across is: where is the source of knowledge? According to Islamic civilization, authentic knowledge is what has been revealed to the Prophet (SAW) through angel Gabriel. In the modern, Western civilization, the source of all knowledge is science.

Again, these two concepts are totally in opposition to each other – science and revelation. And civilizations do not just depend on mere definitions of these two concepts. Their entire belief system is built upon these two core concepts. So essentially modern civilization tells its staunch followers that what is real is only what is observable. If you cannot see anything, it is not there in the first place. Islam’s base, on the other hand, tells a person that belief in the Unseen is everything.

Looking at these two principles and how they illustrate the differences which exist between civilizations, it is ironic that there are people who actually believe that there is a consensus between them. There is no consensus. There is a deep-rooted conflict in their very basic characteristics. Of course there are more than two principles on which civilizations are based, and if I start writing on each of them, it would probably fill a book of ten thousand pages. I’ll settle for two today then, and in the next part, we’ll talk about another two principles.

3) No civilization of the world can be oblivious to the “Principle of Efficient Course.” In layman’s language, it means that this principle analyzes how life and this universe came into being. Here, Islamic civilization tells us that it was Allah (SWT) who simply said “create” and the entire universe was created. It was Allah (SWT) only Who Created Adam (AS) as the first man on Earth.

In response to this belief of the Muslims, the concept of Darwinism was born. Darwin’s theory of evolution and natural selection, which is the brainchild of the modern Western civilization, runs directly counter to the belief that it was Allah (SWT) Who Created the first man on Earth.

Now, the question is, how can one reconcile these two fundamentally different principles, when in reality neither of them can stand the other? The truth is you cannot reconcile them because they are completely different. However, there are people who mistakenly assume that since the Muslim Ummah has never made an effort to strongly insist upon or argue in favor of its principle of the origin of creation, peaceful reconciliation between it and the concept of Darwinism is already in place.

4) There are evidences for the existence of many civilizations in this world. What is similar to all these civilizations is that neither of them has ignored the question of what exactly is the purpose of the human struggle in life? And what are the criteria for labeling something as successful or failure in life?

Islamic civilization gives us the concept of an afterlife – the one who succeeds there has indeed achieved something. In counter to this, the modern Western civilization has furthered the concept of “progress” in the material sense. This is basically the “Principle of Final Cause.” There are many people who express their belief in the fact that Islam is not against material progress. Of course it’s not. But Islam has not made material progress a criterion for measuring one’s success in life either.

Let’s now hear out Arnold Toynbee, a British historian who has written a twelve-volume analysis of the rise and fall of civilizations. He said that technical progress and moral decline are directly proportional to each other. This essentially means that when a civilization progresses technologically, it also faces a moral decline.

According to Toynbee, there are only two means of saving the modern Western civilization. One is to introduce some form of Romanticism in it, and the second is to remove its obsession with technology.

Anyway, the point here is that if you keep in mind the four principles which I have discussed in yesterday’s and today’s columns, you will never be confused on the subject of clash of civilizations no matter who says what. And obviously when it comes to principles, the opinion of an individual matters very little.

There is a very strange trend in our society. Whenever any writer or poet gets the Nobel Prize, people start talking about him/her and his work as if they have known him/her and been reading his/her work their entire lives. The reality is they might not have even heard of him/her before. Similarly, ever since Huntington got his book published and the whole hype of clash of civilizations began, people have been talking about it and discussing it, assuming that the other person too is well aware of they know.

Alhamdulilah I have never been a victim of this trend. An anthology of my columns entitled “Kaghaz Kay Sipahi” has been published. All columns have been taken from the 1990 and 1991 editions of Jasarat. This time period is a good three to four years before Huntington presented his theory of the clash of civilizations. However, in all of those columns, one can find evidences of clash of civilizations, because nearly all of them are criticizing the West. It is Allah (SWT)’s great blessing that I have never made any assumptions about the Western Civilization – neither do I have any new complains against it nor am I hopeful that it is going to change anytime soon.

When Allah (SWT) bestows a comprehensive understanding of principles upon someone, he/she one is spared from learning them the hard way through experience and accidents.

The Psychological and Spiritual Profile of Man in the Context of Islam and the West
Translated by: Hafsa Ahsan

I haven’t been able to learn the art of journalism in fifteen years. One cannot remotely hope that I would have learnt anything about medicine and especially, anatomy either. So how do I sketch out the psychological and spiritual profile of man in the context of Islam and the West? Plus, there is always the danger that people would detect a semblance of clash of civilizations here too.

But if one really wants to do it, it really isn’t that difficult a task. One only needs to publish two photographs side by side. One photograph would be that of a pious Muslim. The other would be that of a modern, Western man. The caption would read that since their external and internal organs are very much the same, there is absolutely no difference between the two. Plus, both of them pretty much look as if they are part of the human race – each have two eyes, two ears, one nose and one heart. It doesn’t matter which religion or nation man belongs to. He will have two intestines all the same, and one will be the large intestine and the other will be the small intestine. So here you have it – a complete physical profile. But what about the psychological and spiritual profile? To ascertain the characteristics of that profile, one will need the negatives of that photograph rather than the photograph itself.

But let’s be fair. We know that the modern Western civilization does not recognize anything beyond the physical structure of man. Whether we are talking about cells or the entire organ system, the approach of the West is strictly material in nature. It does distinguish between the brain and the mind, but its approach even towards the mind of a man is physical in nature. To the modern, Western mind, man is but a one-floor building.

But to the Islamic mind, the same man is a three-floor building. These three floors are:
1) Body
2) Soul
3) Spirit

But wait a minute. How can we possibly put forward our own knowledge in the face of advances that have been made in psychology in the West? Take the psychoanalyst, Sigmund Freud for instance. According to Freud’s structural theory, the human psyche is divided into three parts, which are as follows:
1) Id
2) Ego
3) Super ego

One would think that there is a three-floor building here as well. But let’s look at what these three parts are:
1) The id refers to the primitive desires of man such as hunger and thirst
2) The ego strikes a balance between the id and the super ego
3) The super ego refers to the social norms and culture to which a person must adhere to while satisfying his desires

If we look at the above definitions, we will understand that the ego and super ego are merely extensions of the id. In other words, there are no three floors. There is just one floor and the other two so-called floors are actually the extension of the same floor.

Of course it is said about Freud that his thinking was way ahead of his theories. He has put forward the theory of “death instinct.” According to this theory, there is an inherent urge in every human to return to a state of non-existence. But again, his idea rests on the basic concept of urge and instinct or “id” only.

Carl Jung Reich was a student of Sigmund Freud. He gave his theory of collective unconscious as opposed to Freud’s concept of personal unconscious. According to his theory, the collective unconscious “is characterized by archetypes or instinctual patterns of behavior and perception which can be traced in dreams and myths.” The key word here of course is “instinct” again. So even though on the surface, this theory seems to be spiritual in nature, the fact is that it is again building on the concept of id.

Alfred Adler, who formed the Vienna Psychoanalytic Society along with Freud in 1899, again concentrated only on individual psychology. Wilhelm Reich, who was trained in Vienna by Sigmund Freud, got into everyday psychology and never got out of it. In Freud’s view, there was the concept of dreams and their interpretation, which he discussed in his book “The Interpretation of Dreams.” However, his explanations mainly centre on the Oediplus Complex or sexual behavior.

In contrast to the above theories, the Islamic scholars have expanded on the concept of soul based on the Quran and the Sunnah, and have given its seven parts, much like the seven skies above.

Following are the seven parts of soul or “Nafs”:

1) Misguiding Soul
2) Accusing Soul
3) Peaceful soul
4) Guiding Soul {which gets its guidance directly from Allah (SWT)}
5) Contented Soul 6)
Pleased Soul
7) Liberated Soul

All these souls are a part of every human. Hence, in the eyes of Islamic civilization, the human soul is seven-floor building. On the other hand, the concept of soul in the eyes of the modern, Western civilization does not go beyond the misguided soul. Even though there may be some shades of the accusing soul in man, according to the West, but it is written off as suppression.

It is a sorry state of affairs that there is no concept of spirit in the modern, Western civilization at all, but nonetheless why not compare both of them?

Whenever one talks about the human body, one cannot ignore the five senses of man, which are as follows:

1) Sense of hearing
2) Sense of seeing
3) Sense of touching
4) Sense of smelling
5) Sense of tasting

It is true that these five senses are central to the human body, irrespective of the civilization he belongs to. The difference is that the Western civilization relies solely upon the knowledge that is gathered by man using his five senses. In Islam, this is considered as nothing more than observable knowledge, which is the lowest in the classification of Islamic knowledge.

The importance of Aristotle as a philosopher is central to the modern, Western civilization. White Heater has written about Aristotle that all the Western philosophies after the time of Aristotle are nothing more than the footnote of his own work. But, it is about this same Aristotle that Mujjajid Alf-Sani has written that he went astray because he could not go further than empirical knowledge of this world. To him, this world was the product of rational design.

The concept of common sense is also very much an integral part of the Western civilization. However, one can easily observe that the West has never really understood this term properly. To date, they have a very vague understanding of this term. They consider it as a part of human senses but separate from the five basic senses discussed above. What it actually does is something no one can tell.

In Islamic civilization, out of all attempts to classify knowledge, the classification of Al-Farabi is the most significant. According to Al-Farabi, common sense can actually subjugate and rule over all five human senses. Effectively then, common sense is not only a basic part of the five senses, but is superior to all five of them. Hence, this is the basic importance of common sense. But the West is still unaware of this. It simply knows that there are five senses but about them, it has totally incomplete knowledge. It is ironic then that its entire knowledge has its base in what is collected from these five senses.

In the Western civilization, there is no concept of latent senses or faculties of man. Even when the West does recognize it, it labels it as the different functions that the mind performs rather than a sense or faculty in itself. Then, it also doesn’t have the complete list that Al-Farabi has provided the Islamic civilization with, which is as follows:

1) Faculty of Representation
2) Faculty of Estimation
3) Faculty of Memory
4) Faculty of Composite Human Imagination
5) Faculty of Composite Animal Imagination

There is of course the concept of memory and imagination in the modern, Western civilization but it does not recognize any latent senses of man. One of these latent senses includes the many thoughts and imaginations that humans have. It is sad to note that some of the modern Muslims do not know that thoughts and imaginations are latent rather than apparent human senses. It is Al-Farabi again who has classified all the latent senses of man, with Muslim philosophers after him adding to the original classification.

All this talk leads us to the conclusion that there is a vast contrast between the Islamic and the modern, Western civilization, with the latter more narrow-minded in its approach towards life and man. May Allah (SWT) protect Islam, Islamic thought and the Muslim Ummah from the apparent as well as the latent effects of this modern Western civilization. Ameen!