Muslim world in disarray
By S. G. Jilanee
Back in the nineteenth century Maulana Altaf Hussain Hali wrote an invocation addressed to the Prophet (S.A.W). It began with the lines: "Ai khasa-i-khasan-i-rosul waqt-e-doa hai / Ummat pe teri waqt ajab aan para hai." (O noblest of the noble prophets this is the time to pray. Your Ummah is passing through strange times).
But his lamentation had a local orientation. It was based on the Muslims of India, who lay shattered and demoralized in the aftermath of the 1857 mutiny and the rigorous reprisals of the British army.
Iqbal covered a wider canvas. He took full account of the universal decline of Ummah and catalogued its causes in detail in his Jawab-i-shikwah. Yet, if there has been any change, it seems to have been for the worse.
More than half a century ago, Mohammad Asad (Leopold) Weiss, a Christian convert to Islam, wrote "Islam at the Crossroads." Today, the Ummah seems to have sunk deeper in the doldrums.
What is happening to it is the logical consequence of its own acts. It is a case of self-inflicted wounds. Ummah has been used in the Quran at various places to connote a people, community, nation, or brotherhood, according to the context.
It appears for the first time in 2:134 where it refers to Abraham's progeny, saying, "That was a 'people' that hath passed away." Here, it means "people." In 2:43 it says, "We made of you an Ummah justly balanced that ye might be witness over the nations."
Here, according to translators, the word could be interpreted both as having universal application for the entire Muslim community globally or narrowly in the literal sense to apply to the Arabs only to whom the Message was addressed. (q.v. Abdullah Yusuf Ali, the Holy Quran).
In 10-47 and 16:36 respectively, it is said, "To every Ummah (was sent) a Messenger" and, "We have sent among every Ummah, a Messenger." Here, too, the word carries the sense of "people, or community".
At two other places namely 21:92 and 23:52, scholars have adopted "brotherhood" as the only appropriate interpretation of the term. Says the Quran, "And if thy Lord had so willed He could surely have made mankind one Ummah (people).
Verily this Brotherhood of yours is a single Brotherhood." In Hujurat (49:10) all Muslims are described as brothers (Ikhwatun). "The Believers are a single Brotherhood (49:10).
Explaining the use of brotherhood to translate, Ummah, Yusuf Ali writes, "Community, race, nation, people, are words which import other ideas and do not quite correspond to Ummah.
'Religion' and 'Way of life' are derived meanings which could be used in other passages, but are less appropriate here." He takes note of the universal applicability of the Divine statement here to include "people of very different temperament and virtues, widely different in time, race, language, surroundings, history, and calling, yet forming the closest fraternity as being men and women united in the service of Allah. They pre-figure the final and perfect Brotherhood of Islam."
But, even a cursory look at what the Ummah did with those noble precepts would make the blood boil or the heart weep. The drift had set in as the Prophet had left this world.
The battles of Jamal and Siffeen, the assassination of Usman (R.A.) and Ali (R.A.) and the massacre of Karbala, one after the other, within just fifty years of his demise, demonstrate how the Ummah had profaned the Divine injunctions.
The irony becomes doubly tragic in light of the fact that the Quran repeatedly asserts that it was revealed in their, Arabic, language so it could be easier for them to comprehend.
Subsequently, conquests followed; empires, - Abbasids, Ummaiyads, Fatimids, Ottoman and, in India, Mughal - were built. Islam spread from Mauritania and Morocco on the tip of the Atlantic Ocean, to Indonesia in the Far East, taking parts of Europe, Central Asia and China, in its stride.
As people of other races converted to Islam, and "Ummah" translated, from "Arab people" to "Muslims of all colours and races", it could be justly expected that they would be bound together by the 'Rope of Allah' (habl illah), into a single bond of brotherhood.
They would stand together, shoulder to shoulder, in fair weather and foul, in weal and woe, like a solid cemented structure. "Bunyan um marsoos" (61:4) But that hope, alas, did not materialize. What happened was its opposite. The Ummah fragmented, with cracks appearing both vertically and horizontally.
Forgotten was the clarion call of the Quran which the Prophet (SAW) had repeated at his khutba, namely, "Verily the most honoured among you in the sight of Allah is he who is the most righteous of you." (49:13).
Ignored, likewise, was the admonition to "hold firmly to the "Rope" of Allah and "do not split." On the contrary, such bitterness took hold among sections of the Ummah against one another that even the Kaaba was not spared.
In 928 AD the Qaramtis raided Makkah, slaughtered the pilgrims, desecrated the Kaaba, looted even its covering and took away the Black Stone, which was returned after 20 years! But that is only one part of the story. The more tragic part of it is that after the twelfth century, the pursuit of knowledge also declined. During that glorious period of Muslim history, theologians and jurists had flourished side by side with others who made great strides in other disciplines, such as literature, medicine, science and philosophy.
But from the thirteenth century onwards, it appears that the Muslims retreated into a cocoon which kept every other branch of knowledge out of bounds, science being chosen for the worst opprobrium.
When Renaissance came to Europe, the Ummah was wallowing in utter darkness. There was none to study Francis Bacon and Hobbs and Descartes and answer them. The same Ummah that had thrown up renowned mathematicians and astronomers in the past was nowhere as Europe produced Galileo, Copernicus, Newton, et al and other inventors.
The downside reached a stage when in the early nineteenth century the Russian cannons were shattering the walls of the city of Bokhara, people were sitting in groups in mosques and madressahs and reciting "khatm-i-khwajgan." What happened thereafter is history.
Even today there is not much change in attitudes. The Ummah defies the Divine command. It remains divided. There are circles within circles. One of them is the Arab League, an exclusive club of the Arabic-speaking elite. And the Arab League is sub-divided into groups.
There are Muslim rulers who are literally swimming in a sea of gold, boasting a 2000-room palace where everything from bedsteads to telephones to bathtubs and even commode seats are covered in 24-karat gold plate, besides a throne of gold, gold-plated carriage and even umbrella. But nothing is ever heard of any contribution to encourage pursuit of learning, especially the sciences. No universities established, no scholarships to the promising children of the Ummah offered.
The Ummah is powerless. It does not produce any weapons. And yet, the mullah, jolted from his sleep has gone to the other unwise extreme to preach armed conflict with the enemy who is equipped with the latest technology. This is a sure recipe for suicide.
The fact is that the Ummah is defying Allah's admonitions, injunctions and commands. No amount of chest-beating or wild fulminations will avail. There is no way to recovery except following the Divine guidance.