Probable Western Objections
After reading our presentation of the bases and structure of Qur’anic civilization, some western writers may deem them too utopian to be fulfilled by man and, hence, not destined to endure even when :successfully realized. Such thinkers hold man to be motivated by fear and hope, prejudice and pressure, just like any other animal except that mail adds to his equipment the faculty of speech. To expect humanity to follow a system such as that provided by Islam for civilization is either impossible or extremely difficult. The utmost that we may expect in ordering the life of human society is the regulation of human passion and greed and the orientation of human fear and hope from the economic aspect alone. What is beyond these desiderata is beyond the capacity of human society. The Islamic system, formulated by the Qur’an and described in this chapter, did not survive in Islamic history beyond the days of the Prophet and his immediate successors. This phenomenon constitutes for these thinkers further proof of the utopian nature of that system and its not having enveloped the world. They cite this failure to survive and to spread itself over the world as proof of its unfitness.
Refutation
To refute this claim, it is sufficient to note the acknowledge of its adherents that the Islamic system was indeed realized during the period of the Prophet and that of his immediate successors. Muhammad was indeed the highest exemplar of that system and his application of it the highest instance of its feasibility. His immediate successors followed his example and carried his own application of it to perfection. Under the influence of various Israelitisms [An “Israelitism” is usually a spurious interpretation of, or a fabricated addition to, an Islamic religious text, the Qur’an being naturally excluded. While most “Israelitisms” had to do with Islamic doctrine, tradition, and semitic history, their purpose was always to subvert the faith from within. They are supposed to be the work of Jews of the first two centuries who ostensibly converted to Islam but who nursed for it the strongest hatred. -Tr.] and provincialisms, [Provincialism, or “ahu’ubiyyah,” is the name given by Muslim historians to every centrifugal movement in the Islamic empire, such as Persian nationalism, Turkish nationalism, Coptic nationalism, etc. -Tr.] that system was gradually dissolved by intrigue and corruption. Slowly but surely, men allowed material considerations to overrule the spiritual, and animal passion to elbow out the humane until mankind reached the situation of the present day in which it suffers from the most terrible miseries.
The Example of Muhammad
Muhammad’s example was the best application of Islamic civilization as elaborated in the Qur’an. From this work, the reader may remember how the Prophet extended his fraternity to all men without distinction. In Makkah, he regarded himself and his fellows absolutely on a par in poverty and suffering. Indeed, he assumed the greater share of privation and suffering for their sake. When he emigrated to Madinah, he established this fraternity between the Muhajirun and Ansar so firmly that he granted the privileges and obligations incumbent upon real blood relationship to all. In that period, the fraternity of believers was based upon mutual love and the common will to raise the foundations of the new civilization. It was fed and reinforced by a genuine iman in God, a faith and a conviction whose strength carried Muhammad to communion with God Himself-may He be adored. At the campaign of Badr, Muhammad called upon God to give him the promised victory and prayed to Him saying, that should the Muslims be defeated at Badr, God would not be worshipped in Arabia. This is strong evidence of that communion with the Divine. Indeed, many such stands which Muhammad took on other occasions point to his constant communion with God. These were moments other than those of revelation. It was this communion with the Divine based on his true iman in God which enabled Muhammad not to fear death but, indeed, to seek it. This was only as it should be, for the man of genuine conviction never fears death but welcomes it. Every life has a term, and death will reach its object wherever it may be. No man may escape. It was this conviction that enabled Muhammad to stand firmly on his ground when the Muslims ran away in panic at the outbreak of hostilities at Hunayn. When practically surrounded with death, Muhammad paid no attention to it and called his men to rally forth around him. It was this iman that made him give liberally without fear of poverty or privation and enabled him to do good to the orphan, the wayfarer, the deprived, and the suffering. In brief, it enabled him to rise to the highest pinnacle of every Qur’anic virtue. All this, as well as the Muslims’ close observance of his example in the first period of their history, caused Islam to spread in the years immediately following the death of Muhammad and to establish itself by planting the seeds of Islamic civilization in every land. Finally, it was this iman that transformed corrupt and decadent peoples into strong and progressive states seeking knowledge and advancement, discovering the secrets of the universe, and developing creativity in every field of human endeavor. These same states can vie successfully even with the accomplishments of the modern age, the so-called ‘Age of Light and Science,’ an age so unsuccessful in bringing about happiness to mankind because of an iman weak in God and strong in matter.
The Misguided ‘Ulama’
However, like any other civilization of Western Asia and Europe Islamic civilization was corrupted by the prejudices engendered by provincialism or Israelitism. This corruption is attributable to the fact that a number of ‘ulama’, who are normally expected to be the heirs of the Prophets, preferred power to the truth, worldly glory to virtue, and used their knowledge and leadership to misguide the community of the people and their young in the same way as do the ‘Mama’ of this age. Such ‘ulama’ however are the devil’s associates. Upon them will fall the greatest responsibility on the Day of Judgment. It is the first duty of every modern ‘alim, true to God and to his knowledge, to fight the misguiding ‘ulama’ and combat the evil propaganda they spread. If such ‘ulama’ have any kind of place in Christendom where the church and science have to fight each other and compete for power, they have utterly no place in the Islamic world where religion and science are close associates, where religion without science is deemed unbelief and ungodly, and where science without religion is deemed delusion. Had mankind entered into the civilization of Islam as the Qur’an depicts it, had the Mongols not destroyed its great centers, and had the insincere converts to Islam not taken their Islam as a means for subjecting the community of Muslims to their dominion, a dominion based on the opposite of Islamic fraternity, the world would have had a different destiny. Mankind would not have been subject to the miseries it finds itself under today.
Islamic Civilization and the Future
I am nonetheless certain that Qur’anic civilization will conquer the world if a group of ‘Mama’ rise today to call for it in a progressive, open, and scientific manner. This civilization addresses itself to both the heart and reason. It appeals to all men and to all people; no vested interests and no prejudices will be able to prevent their movement toward it. Nor is it required that such ‘ulama’ have any more than a genuine iman, and that they sincerely call men to God. Then will mankind find their happiness in this fraternity in God as they found it in the Prophet’s time.
The accomplishments of the period of the Prophet and of that of his immediate successors constitute evidence for my claim, advanced in the preface to this work, that scientific research into the spiritual revolution which Muhammad initiated in this world will guide mankind to the new civilization toward which it has been groping. There is no doubt whatever in this regard. Western men of knowledge object to this claim by deploring the spirit dominating Islamic civilization. On the basis of these objections, they accuse Islam of causing the decay and degradation of the Muslim peoples. The most important of these objections is the claim that the determinism of Islam weakens the will of its people, disables them from participating in the struggle for existence, and brings about their decadence and subjugation. To expose the falsity of this claim and other claims will be the purpose of the second essay in this conclusion.
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br /> II. ISLAMIC CIVILIZATION AND THE WESTERN ORIENTALISTS
Irving and Islamic Determinism
Washington Irving, one of the greatest writers the United States of America produced in the nineteenth century, is a real credit to his people. He has written a biography of the Arab Prophet in which the material is presented in an eloquent and captivating manner. Although his treatment is well taken at times, it is prejudiced at others. His book ends with a conclusion in which he presents the principles of Islam and what he has taken to be the historical sources of those principles. After mentioning iman in God, in His angels, Books, prophets, and the Day of Judgment, Washington Irving wrote
“The sixth and last article of the Islam faith is PREDESTINATION, and on this Mahomet evidently reposed his chief dependence for the success of his military enterprises. He inculcated that every event had been predetermined by God, and written down in the eternal tablet previous to the creation of the world. That the destiny of every individual and the hour of his death were irrevocably fixed, and could neither be varied nor evaded by any effort of human sagacity or foresight. Under this persuasion the Moslems engaged in battle without risk; and, as death in battle was equivalent to martyrdom, and entitled them to an immediate admission into paradise, they had in either alternative, death or victory, a certainty of gain.
“This doctrine, according to which men by their own free will can neither avoid sin nor avert punishment, is considered by many Mussulmen as derogatory to the justice and clemency of God; and several sects have sprung up, who endeavor to soften and explain away this perplexing dogma; but the number of these doubters is small, and they are not considered orthodox.
“The doctrine of Predestination was one of those timely revelations to Mahomet that were almost miraculous from their seasonable occurrence. It took place immediately after the disastrous battle of Ohod, in which many of his followers, and among them his uncle Hamza, were slain. Then it was, in a moment of gloom and despondency, when his followers around him were disheartened, that he promulgated this law, telling them that every man must die at the appointed hour, whether in bed or in the field of battle. He declared, moreover, that the angel Gabriel had announced to him the reception of Hamza into the seventh heaven, with the title of Lion of God and of the Prophet. He added, as he contemplated the dead bodies, ‘I am witness for these, and for all who have been slain for the cause of God, that they shall appear in glory at the resurrection, with their wounds brilliant as vermilion and odoriferous as musk.’
“What doctrine could have been devised more calculated to hurry forward, in a wild career of conquest, a set of ignorant and predatory soldiers, than assurance of booty if they survived, and paradise if they fell? It rendered almost irresistible the Moslem arms; but it likewise contained the poison that was to destroy their dominion. From the moment the successors of the Prophet ceased to be aggressors and conquerors, and sheathed the sword definitely, the doctrine of predestination began its baneful work. Enervated by peace, and the sensuality permitted by the Koran-which so distinctly separates its doctrine from the pure and self-denying religion of the Messiah-the Moslem regarded every reverse as preordained by Allah, and inevitable; to be borne stoically, since human exertion and foresight were vain. ‘Help thyself and God will help thee,’ was a precept never in force with the followers of Mahomet ; and its reverse has been their fate. The crescent has waned before the cross, and exists in Europe, where it was once so mighty, only by the suffrage, or rather the jealously of the great Christian powers, probably ere long to furnish another illustration, that ‘they that take the sword shall perish with the sword.’ [Washington Irving, Mahomet and His Successors, Philadelphia, J. B. Lippincott and Co., 1871, Vol, I, pp. 360-362.]
Falsity of Irving’s Criticism
These are the words of Washington Irving. They are the words of a man whose study fell short of grasping the spirit of Islam and of its civilization. Hence, his false interpretation of the problem of divine providence and predestination. Perhaps Irving had some excuse in that some of the Islamic books which he may have read do in fact point in the direction of his interpretation. As for the Qur’an, the dictum “God helps them that help themselves” is far too weak to be even comparable to its emphatic call for self-reliance, its thunderous warning that men will receive exactly what their deeds and intentions had earned for them. God said
“Say, O Men, the truth has come to you from your Lord. Whoever is guided thereby is so to his own credit; whoever is not so guided is so to his own discredit.”
In another passage God said: “Whoever is guided by the truth will earn the advantage thereof, and whoever goes astray will earn the disadvantage thereof. Do not extrapolate responsibility. No punishment is due until a prophet has been duly sent and men have been duly warned; . . . whoever seeks the advantage of the other world will receive the same and more of it. Whoever seeks the advantage of this world will receive the same, but he will have no share in the other .... God does not change the conditions of a people until that people have changed their conditions by themselves.”! [Qur’an, 10:108; 17:15; 42:20; 13:11]
The Qur’an and Determinism
It is, therefore, a clearly Qur’anic position that man’s will and action are the sole determinants of his worth, of his punishment or reward. Emphatically, God has urged man to go forth into the world to seek its fruits and to enjoy them.- He commanded self-exertion in His cause in very strong terms as may be seen from many verses quoted in this book. This is all irreconcilable with Irving’s claim, which has been repeated by a number of other westerners, that Islam is a religion of lethargy and reliance, that it teaches its adherents that they can in no way influence whatever befalls them, whether good or evil, and hence that there is no point in their trying to do so. This claim argues that will and efficacy are exclusive prerogatives of God; that man’s efforts come to naught when the divine decree orders otherwise; and that if it were decreed that somebody would become rich, strong, or a believer, this would surely come to pass without any effort or action on his part. The verses we have already cited all run counter to these claims.
It may also be possible that these western writers and thinkers attribute the lethargy and reliance of the Muslims in the recent period of their history to the Qur’anic verses which pertain to divine providence in the manner of the following: “No man may expire, except by permission of God and at a prefixed term .... every people has a term; so that whenever that term arrives, that people must fulfill that which is proper thereto at its time, neither before nor after it . . . . whatever calamity befalls the earth or your own persons is predetermined before it happens. Such determination is easy for God .... Say, ‘Nothing shall befall us except that which God has predetermined for us. He is our Lord; and upon Him the believers will rely.’ [Qur’an, 3:145; 7:34; 57:22; 9:51] But if this is the line of their reasoning, then they have misunderstood the meanings of these verses and others like them. Misunderstanding these verses, they think Islam calls for resignation, whereas the Qur’an meant to stress the solid bond between God and His dedicated servants. The fact is that Islam is a religion which calls for exactly the opposite, for dynamism and personal initiative, self-exertion and sacrifice, self-respect and dignity, while it founds its civilization on brotherhood and mercy. Islam is the one religion which does so par excellence!
Scientific Determinism
As a matter of fact, these and like verses point to a scientific truth recognized by most western philosophers and men of science in which determinism is ascribed to the general pattern of the cosmos as a whole rather than to God, the Almighty and Omniscient. This view is narrower, more rigid, and less amenable to the good of mankind than the philosophic view deducible from the Qur’an, as we shall see in the sequel. Scientific determinism teaches that man has no freedom except in the narrowest and most insignificant fields and that this little freedom is relative and is evident only as a practical consequence of social needs, but not from any established scientific
or philosophical reality. It is not a principle but a provision. For without some provision for freedom of choice, it would be impossible for society to find a basis for its legislation, for the regulations it imposes on all its members under threat of criminal and civil sanction. True, some men of science and jurisprudence do not regard punishment or sanction as based on either determinism or on freedom, and they explain punishment as a response on the part of society to the need for self-preservation, just as an individual would react for his own self-preservation. It is all one for society when it reacts in self-preservation, whether the individual criminal has been free or determined in the perpetration of his crime. Nonetheless, freedom of action is still the foundation for most jurists. Their evidence therefore is the principle that the person devoid of freedom and choice, such as the insane, the child, and the moron, are never judged as the conscious man who distinguishes between good and evil.
The Life of Muhammad Page 75
