March 24, 2006

Resolving an Impasse

Muzaffar Iqbal

Even the most liberal interpretation of Islam’s two basic sources will have to remain within the broad outline of the belief system and the moral and ethical values envisioned by the Qur’an and Sunnah. No amount of interpretation can, for instance, make eating of pork or drinking of wine or gambling permissible. In an atmosphere ripe with confusion, politically motivated ideas, and outright attempts at distortion, a base line has to be drawn for a meaningful dialogue between the liberals and not-so-liberals and the clear and unambiguous framework of moral and ethical values of Islam can provide a framework for this attempt. All schools of interpretation agree on what is Halal (permissible) and what is not. There may be occasional disagreement on certain details, but all Muslims familiar with the Qur’anic concept of Hudud Allah (boundaries of Allah) have a common understanding of the basic framework in which a life pleasing to the Creator ought to be lived.

Likewise, in the realm of beliefs (`aqaid), all Muslims have a basic understanding of the human condition: we are all created on fitrah, given certain arzaq (provisions), and put in various situations throughout our lives. We neither choose the time of our birth, nor that of our departure from this world. We come into this world as helpless babes and depart from here at a pre-fixed moment which cannot be altered by anyone. Everyone leaving this world departs with nothing but the deeds performed during this allotted time. “Three things accompany a bier,” the Prophet of Islam, may Allah’s peace and blessings be upon him, has told us, “his or her relatives, wealth, and deeds. Two come back, the third remains with the deceased: his (or her) relatives and wealth return to the world, only the deeds stay.” And it is really these deeds which will be measured on a scale on the Day when nothing will remain hidden.

This broad outline of the Islamic belief system is shared by all Muslims and can be the common basis for a dialogue between the warring segments. Those who call for a liberal interpretation of Islam may have genuine complaints against those who ceaselessly depict the horrors of the Afterlife in an all-consuming Hell, but no Muslim can deny the existence of such a place while remaining true to his or her beliefs. Likewise, the reality of a Day of Reckoning and a life to come in the Hereafter are not matters of interpretation, but solidly anchored facts and cannot be wished away.

This broad view of Islam presents no problems to any side. But as soon as we begin to apply this belief system to a given polity, there appear numerous politically and emotionally charged issues such as the position of women, the Islamic concept of Jihad, the way to apply Islamic penal code in a given society, and the whole range of issues in the domains of economic, social, and moral values. These issues are further complicated by certain recent attempts to “enforce” Islam. These attempts have provided ample ammunition to the “liberals” to genuinely express horror and disgust: “if Taliban’s practices are what Islam is all about then we are better off without it.”

The reconstruction of Islamic polity anywhere on earth in the present era is, indeed, fraught with certain basic problems, but the main issue is not these problems themselves which require creative solutions, but the fact that these are seldom acknowledged by the champions of Islam and are often taken by the liberals as insurmountable; issues like the place of Jihad in the contemporary world, the position of women, the presumed impossibility of the establishment of an Islamic economic system, and many other similar issues are really complex problems which cannot be solved by slogans, long marches, or merely by winning seats in assemblies and forming governments in the name of Islam.

In a world rapidly shrinking under the combined impact of technological advances and political, economic, and cultural forces operating globally, the construction of an Islamic polity is not an easy task. It requires tremendous amount of Ijtihad, but true Ijtihad can only be performed by those who are qualified to do so. And this is where Muslims have shown incompetence and where they have opened the field to those who wish to make Islam a relic of the past. Due to this vacuum, Islam is generally perceived by non-Muslims and many “liberal Muslims” as a religion which might still have relevance for the individual, but which cannot be the basis of a polity existing in the twenty-first century. This perception has been further clouded by the association of Islam with violence.

The onus of proving Islam’s relevance to the contemporary world at the collective level is now really on Muslim scholars. But such Muslim scholars are no where to be found and in their absence, the raging Mullahs and the liberals of all shades have enacted a soap opera which keeps on repeating the nauseating anecdotes day after day. This, in a nutshell, is the essence of current debates between the liberals and not-so-liberals.

Of course, the most urgent question for those who wish to break this deadlock and see a resolution is: What can be done to bring to an end the present nightmare of intellectual and social anarchy, confusion, and violence? This question is directly related to the methodology of establishing an Islamic polity. In other words, the real issue of our times is: How can Muslims regain a certain degree of clarity and empowerment to construct their societies on the basis of what they really believe?

Under these circumstances, the challenge is really for the Islamic scholars. They not only have to lay out the theoretical foundation of the reconstruction of Islamic polity in the twenty-first century, but also train a large number of people to carry out this task in a world from which the very concept of Islam—submission to the Creator—is being increasingly drained. As for the “liberals”, they will remain fortified in their self-created and illusionary citadels until they are shown the viability of Islam in a certain polity in our own time. They can, however, participate in this process by sharpening their questions and by genuinely engaging the not-so-liberals in substantial issues, rather than empty rhetoric.

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