December 02, 2005
The procedure for the emergence of an Islamic state in our times has been outlined by a handful of 20th century thinkers, but none has explained it in such exacting detail as Sayyid Abu’l-A’la Mawdudi (1903-79). Mawdudi’s systematic and coherent formulation of the vision of Islam as a viable alternative to the secular political philosophies which began at a time when most of the Muslim lands were under the colonial yoke and Islam was considered to be a spent force, at least by the West. His emergence as a major leader of Islamic revival has a classical pattern: he first transformed himself by a slow process of understanding of Islam, he then sought to transform others. In later years, he would recall his own transformation as a sort of "conversion", as if he rediscovered Islam with its full significance in the late 1920s and once this vision of Islam had solidified within his own being, he could not help but to set his life goal "to strive in the path of truth, to propagate its cause, and to bring (his) vision into reality."
As mentioned in previous installments, an Islamic state can only emerge in our times through the centuries-old, time-tested, Divinely-revealed procedure of transformation of a small number of men and women into truly dedicated believers, who then attract a small community around a leader; this core community then becomes the nucleus of a new social, economic, and political order. This is the procedure adopted by the Prophet of Islam (may Allah’s peace and blessing be upon him) as well as by all Prophets prior to him and all reformers since his time. There is, really, no other way to this end, and Mawdudi understood this well.
Mawdudi followed this method of establishing a core group, first at Pathankot in 1938 and later through the establishment of Jama’at-i-Islami in August 1941. This was the time when Muslims of the Indian subcontinent were being led by secularised leaders who had gathered on the platform of a political party which was established with the blessings of overbearing colonial rulers and greatly influenced by landowners and turncoats. The establishment of Jama’at-i-Islami was one of the most significant events in the 20th century Islamic revival, though few realised its importance at that time.
By the time of the establishment of Jama’at-i-Islami in Lahore, Mawdudi’s political ideas had been clearly stated in a number of works and he had outlined the path to the emergence of an Islamic state. Mawdudi’s articulation of the path to Islamic revival and eventual emergence of an Islamic state was so solidly rooted in the Islamic tradition that it acquired tremendous power by the sheer weight of its truth, for truth always has an inherent power. This is reflected in the impact Mawdudi and Jama’at had on the fundamental documents of new nation-state during the early years of Pakistan. The Objective Resolution of 1949 and the Constitution of 1956 both testify to his tremendous influence although neither he nor the Jama’at had any political strength in terms of electoral victories.
But just when the newly emerging cadres of Jama’at and the half-trained inner core was on the verge of a deep personal transformation and ready to be a cohesive, dynamic, and powerful community which could catalyse the greater transformation of the entire country, leading to an organic emergence of the Islamic state, something snapped within Mawdudi. Instead of following the Prophetic path, he now chose to follow the path of elections, street politics, and secular tactics. This was in 1951. The Jama’at participated in the Punjab elections and hardly any of its candidates could get more than a few votes.
This most puzzling turn in Mawdudi’s career was to change the entire sequence of events in Pakistan, and though the Jama’at continued to have a residual impact on the subsequent history of Pakistan, the possibility of emergence of an Islamic state was destroyed by none other than its most articulate propagator.
Mawdudi was advised by some of the other thinkers who had gathered on the platform of the Jama’at not to follow this course, but personal short-sightedness and a penchant for quick gains had so clouded his vision that he could not see anything beyond the immediate political gains, though even those proved to be ephemeral. In the process, however, he created a breach within the ranks of the Jama’at he had worked so hard to establish. When he found himself opposed by the senior leaders of the Jama’at who had reviewed the entire course of events leading to Mawdudi’s betrayal of his own ideas, he resigned from the Jama’at. But since his position in the Jama’at was central, he knew that his resignation would create enormous pressure on the Shura and that is exactly what happened. He took back his resignation and those who opposed him resigned, paving the way for the emergence of an unchallenged, autocratic leadership of one man in a Jama’at that had been established to follow the Prophetic path. This betrayal of the cause not only reduced the Jama’at-i-Islami to the stature of a secular political party, it also doomed the possibility of the emergence of an Islamic state.
In a poignant letter addressed to Mawdudi, Mawlana Amin Ahsan Islahi, who would later write one of the best 20th-century commentaries of the Qur’aan (Tadabbur al-Qur’aan), wrote: "The Jama’at that had arisen on the pattern of the Prophetic tradition, now adopted immoral, secular tactics because its leader advocated the principle that pragmatic principles require a different methodology than ideological commitments." This secular, utterly non-Islamic and thoroughly immoral contraction, which was to remain Jama’at-i-Islami’s main philosophy after 1951, not only destroyed the noble cause for which it was established, it also prevented the emergence of an Islamic state in Pakistan. Once again, it was proved that an Islamic state can only emerge if the leaders of the Islamic movement remain true to the Prophetic mode. The validity of this principle was proven in 1979 when a 79-year-old man was able to lead a revolution, leading to the emergence of the first Islamic state in modern history. Imam Khomeini succeeded where Mawlana Mawdudi had failed. Why?
(To be continued)
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