The Pakistani Spectator

(Note: This was written a little while ago, but I think is still timely)

Something is rotten in the world; the stench is unbearable. In the late evenings, sometimes, I want to stand atop the roof of my house and shout: I want to breathe clean, crisp, aromatic air. Yes, pure air, free of bigotry, hatred, self-righteousness, fanaticism, imperialism, greed, power.

Voices come to me from two extremes, from two elevated pulpits, voices that are saturating my world with their filth. Two men, both awash in their moral certitude—George Bush and Usama Bin laden—want to claim my world as their own, and both claim to hear the voice of God. I shall not hear you I say, for the time of the prophets is passed and I don’t suffer demagogues. But, still, their voices drown my words, silencing my discourse before it has been birthed.

The two extremes employ a synonymous logic: they want war to find peace, more boots on the ground, more mujahids in the field. While one finds rationalizations for his policies in the works of intellectual rats working for think tanks like Heritage Foundation, the other seeks the seal of approval from the Mullahs for whom war is the only path to spiritual glory. In this two headed monstrous system, those dying are the very people for whom these demagogues want to change the world. They want us to seal our lips and be complicit in their falsehoods.

To them I say: I have resolved to speak, and speak I shall Goddamnit, and you shall hear me, for it is after all my world, the world of the silent majority whose voice has always been held hostage by the powerful. This is not a lament, for my world is not dead yet, nor is it an appeal, for I am tired of beseeching. This is rather a manifesto, a compassionate look at the world as it is, to articulate a world that can be. There will be no apologies, no footing, self-effacing rhetoric, and while I will strongly chastise the West, I will mostly explore the traumas, the troubles, and the possibilities of my primary world: the world of Islam.

Much of what I have to say is very personal and deeply troubling, but I must say it for silence is no longer an option. A lot is being said about the world of Islam. The list of charges is fairly large:

Islam is a violent religion.
Most Muslims are fanatics.
Muslims hate Jews and Christians.
Muslims treat the women terribly.
Muslims are reluctant to assimilate.
Islam is anti-modern.

Based on such charges, various remedies are concocted by liberal and conservative American think tanks, by Euro-American politicians, by world bank and IMF: seems like everyone is trying to save Islam from itself. But these are really serious allegations. How to answer them? How to take them seriously and use them to look deeply at our own culture, for what others say of us might not be true, but is a signifier of our worth in the eyes of the other.
I write this work at a turbulent time. Much is happening in the Islamic world: The U.S and her allies are bringing democracy to Iraq and Afghanistan, and somehow, it seems, close air-support and frequent bombings are essential for this process of democratization; in my home country—Pakistan—the military government is busy conquering its own people in the North West Frontier and in Balochistan; in Palestine, the people are being punished for electing a government that Israel and the Euro-America do not like; Iran is insisting that it has an equal right to life destroying technologies as its western counterparts. In Somalia, the Islamist Militias have just recently defeated the U.S funded warlord thugs. Meanwhile, in the dusty streets of Pakistan and other Islamic heartlands, people are tired of the false promises of the market economy and high capitalism.

They are hungry, tired, and angry at the unjust world around them, a world that can only be kept in balance through brute force. In such turbulent times, I plan to confront the riddle of modern Islam. I might not be able to provide many conclusive answers—in fact, I promise none—but I will raise some serious questions.
How did we get here? What have we become, fourteen hundred years after the time of the Prophet of Islam, Muhammad (Peace be Upon Him) who is called Rehmatul-lil-Aalameen? How does someone like Usama, a fanatic killer of women and children, claim to be, with a certain degree of popular support, the spokesperson for the religion of Muhammad the kind, the just, the humble? Forget the non-Muslims. How is it that we the Muslims treat each other in such degrading ways? Why is it that in the shining new cities of Saudi Arabia, the hordes of immigrant Muslim workers live in dank apartments and have to get a signed document from their sponsors to visit their Muslim friends in another Saudi city? Why is it that when the Kuwaiti government issues gas masks to its citizens before the start of the second Iraq War, they exclude the majority, the laborers and the garbage collectors from Bangladesh, Pakistan, and other forgotten parts of the Muslim world? Why is that the Saudis use Rafeeq—one of the three words for a friend—for the Muslims of my kind, while the other two—shaqeeq and sadeeq—are reserved for fellow Arabs and Americans? Yes, there is something rotten in the world, and that includes the world of Islam. Let us talk about it with an open mind, with a sense of history, with a care for the present, and with a hope for the future.

“Force when necessary, love all the time” (Naguib Mahfooz).

On a hot July afternoon in 1991, I climbed Mount Hira. Compared to towering Himalayas of Pakistan, Hira is no giant, but the climb was made hard by my pilgrim’s sandals and the intense heat. It is a barren, forbidding mountain, a place to go to if you want to be alone. After about an hour’s climb I reached the hidden cave: cave of Hira. I had probably traced the footsteps of the prophet who used to climb this mountain to seek solace in the womb of the cave. This is where he walked, the last of the prophets, the orphan, the perfect being, the savior of all worlds, known and unknown. The experience was elating and terrifying: it is not easy to walk the path of the prophets. When you reach the cave, you have to stoop low to enter; there is place only for one person in there. Entering the cave is like leaving the world behind, like entering a parallel universe. I prayed there, two rakkat’s of naf’l. And then it struck me: I have probably rested my forehead at the very spot where the prophet might have, fourteen hundred years ago. This is where it all began, fourteen hundred years ago. A man entered the cave as a deeply troubled, introspective forty-year old, and came out as the savior of the universe. Quite a transformation.
In that cave one evening, the Muslim historians inform us, Angel Gibreel, God’s messenger to the prophets, revealed himself to Muhammad. The prophet was terrified, for the angel’s stature covered the entire universe, North, South, the East and the West. And then Gibreel said the most profound words in human history. He said: Iqra, read! “I am unlettered and cannot read” the prophet replied. Gibreel said again: Iqra bisme rabbe kalla zi khalaq, Read in the name of your God, who created you! The prophet repeated the verses, which became the first installment of a revelation that would last for twenty three years and would eventually become the Qur’an. We know this story, for it is included in all our records. But there is another part of it that we mention in our histories, but then chose to forget.
When the prophet left the cave that evening, he was shocked. He had seen and experienced something unbelievable; he had been given a burden that the “mountains had refused to carry.” So when the prophet reached his home, he was shaking. It was Khadija-tul-Kubra, his wife, who reassured him, who covered him in a blanket, consoled him and gave him her seal of acceptance, she said la takhaf, don’t be afraid. This is the story, for when the prophet of God was unsure of his mission and terrified of having faced the unthinkable, the kind words of Khadija restored his confidence in himself: she was the first convert to Islam. Let us not forget that. It was also Khadija’s wealth that enabled the prophet to focus more on the inner turmoil instead of wasting his energies on the day-to-day struggles of existence. Let us not forget that either.
The Saudis, who discourage pilgrims from climbing Mount Hira, will have you believe that the only true Islam is the one sanctioned by their King and their Mullahs. Don’t believe that either, for in Islam there is no room for absolute kings, nor is there any place for self-appointed interpreters of the tradition. The Saudis will also have you believe that women need to be secluded, hidden, and silenced, and that men have a right to have four wives as long as they can provide for them. The Saudis will have you believe all these things because through the accident of time and space, they have somehow ended up with the custodianship of the holiest places of Islam, which gives their assertions greater legitimacy. But find me a justification for hereditary kingship in the Qur’an and the Sunnah of the prophet, and I will probably hear them out.
So what was Muhammad’s message? What’s the essence of it? Where to look for it? What was he sent for as last of the prophets? The Qur’an tells us that Muhammad was sent as a gift to the world as Rehmatul-lil-Aalameen, as blessing to all the worlds. This means that for all practical purposes his example is the one that every Muslim must cherish and emulate. His main message was to remind the world of one basic truth: La ilaha illallah he Muamad ar rasulallah, there is no god but Allah and Muhammad is his prophet. These are the two basic conditions for becoming a Muslim: There is but one God and that Muhammad is his prophet. A belief in God is inextricably liked with a belief in Muhaammad’s prophethood, and hence by extension the more prophet-like a Muslim is the better Muslim he or she becomes. Foregrounding the prophet serves an important function: it makes the relationship of humans and God, a relationship of love and not fear, for Muhammad, after all, is God’s Mehboob, His beloved. The Sufis understood this, and their branch of Islam is full of love, the Saudis have eliminated this from their tradition, hence the harshness of their world-view. I will say Muhammad’s message was love: Love of humankind.