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Dr. Iqbal Syed Hussain

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Making Islam relevant to modern thought

The Globalization of anti-Muslim Malice

Dr. Iqbal Syed Hussain

At a time when the Quran is being burnt and the Prophet Muhammad’s caricatures are being fabricated misconceptions and misinterpretations are devouring the very essence of peace, understanding and harmony. Religious thinking largely polluted by false propaganda and bias based perceptions is a relic of the past ages. Yet outmoded, distorted notions with pernicious maneuvers are spreading their tentacles to mislead the followers of other creeds and religions. This is the most disturbing phenomenon of the modern age. Devoid of reason and logic it has made not only the concept of religion superfluous, but equally led to destroying the world peace and order. The human intellect with all the scientific and philosophical explanations seems to have vanished from the domain of fanatics and diehard conservatives.

The present age in spite of all the scientific advance that it has accomplished over the past decades, remains barren in terms of understanding and tolerance. Notions like Islamophobia and ‘Clash of Civilizations’ are the major constraints which constitute a dilemma for modern thinkers and writers. The present age in which science dominates the world phenomena is nevertheless influenced exceedingly by the neo-cons and fundamentalists who have been actively engaged in their onslaughts on Muslims and their culture and civilization especially since the 9/11 attack on World Trade Center in New York. This was a pretext which the Americans exploited to the best potential of their military, scientific, and media preserves.

These ‘monstrous happenings ‘reveal a depth of wickedness and irrationality. It makes one wonder on the contradictions between enlightened humanism and human bestiality. It leads us to reevaluate the essence of religion, the efficacy of reason and essential human values which both the Qur’an and the Bible illuminate. How can we explain the facts that hundreds of thousands of innocent lives have been sacrificed at the altar of national and religious priorities both during the crusades and recent wars in the Middle East? How can we reassess the judgment of fanatics like Pastor Peter Jones and cartoonists in Denmark who burnt the Qur’an and fabricated the images of the Holy Prophet Muhammad (PBUH).

While reexamining the Christian fundamentalism we find in Grollier’s Academic American Encyclopedia the term ‘fundamentalism’ applies to the doctrines which were based on a literal interpretation of the Bible. The Christian fundamentalist insist on belief in the inerrancy of the Bible, the virgin birth and divinity of Jesus Christ, the vicarious and atoning character of his death, his bodily resurrection, and the second coming of the irreducible minimum of authentic Christianity.

Islamic fundamentalism, as denounced by the Christian neo-conservatives, however, does not follow such doctrinaire implications and is related simply to the fundamentals of the Qur’an. In spite of critical Christian onslaughts we have not yet had any consensus on the concept of Islamic fundamentalism. The critics have not yet been able to explain how the Islamic version poses a serious threat to world pace. But they are virulent in their attacks against Islam and carry out a concerted campaign both in te4ms of military and media which is not less than crusade. A recent American documentary, produced by Steven Emerson, called it ‘Jihad in America’ . Emerson narrates the story with the bombing of the World Trade Center and concludes with the assertion that Muslims want to establish an Islamic Empire in the world. This is an absurd argument as with the current degenerate conditions no one can assume Muslims to undertake such drastic measures which might lead to such a dramatic climax even in next hundred years.

The anti-Muslim malice is highly exaggerated and mainly baseless as the majority of Americans have very little understanding about Islam and the tenets of the Qur’an. Many wrong conceptions about Islam are made to contaminate the general stream of thought and converted into distorted perceptions to generate hatred and Islampophobia. Jihad in particular is defined in a pernicious way to build an ugly picture of Islam and Muslims. By adding extra toxicity to the issue Islam has been depicted as a concept contrived to kill and brutalize human beings. While in fact it is a struggle to ensure the sanctity of human and religious life. It is primarily a struggle against the diabolical designs that prompt man to indulge in nefarious activities.

The western right-wing political proclivities coupled with political perception and media caricatures are intended to create images that hardly represent the truth and openly deviate from the path of objective appraisal of real situations. For example, reporting on the situation in Iran Ayatollah Khomeini’s revolution is depicted as an act of suppression of his people, while hardly any mention is made of the brutal bestiality perpetrated by the Shah’s forces in the pre-revolution days.

Then coming to Israel, Egypt and Algeria the “Islamic holy warriors” are depicted as violent infiltrators causing severe attacks on innocent people. Target shooting by unidentified warriors is portrayed as a part of training to carry out holy war. These acts of violence are, in fact, the deeds of Jihadis, claim the producers of the western documentaries. Emerson in a recent documentary, by putting together isolated events and persons from Pakistan to the US, fabricates a story of purported conspiracy against the world. The critics believe that such stories are developed to denounce Islam and Muslims. They are designed to misrepresent the events and create hatred against Islam. This is how the ugly dragon of Islamophobia is made to raise its head and expand its tentacles to devour the segments of humanity.

At the same time Muslim authors and writers are not allowed to present their point of view in an open and unbiased way in the western press. A few years ago when this author wrote an article in London Times explaining the salient features of Islamic culture and Muslim way of living he was snubbed by diehard conservatives condemning the Islamic values and Muslim perception of culture and ethics. The situation became so critical that he had to seek police protection to save his skin. All this happened in a land which is known for its tolerant and civilized behaviour.

The pernicious perception in recent years has been enlarged by the right-wing fringe parties such as the neo-conservatives in America, BNP and English Defence League in Britain and Le Pen in France. A senior member of the party Simon Owens was also reported to have burnt the Qur’an. Although the government has condemned it as an act of provocation which cannot be tolerated in a pluralist and tolerant society, yet such acts continue to leave their noxious effects on the fabric of human society and in particular on the integrity and security of the ethnic communities.

A: Similar hatred-provoked incidents continue to emerge in other countries like America France, and Denmark. This shows that there is a trend towards the globalization of Islamophobia and a move towards realizing the goals of the theory of the clash of civilizations. The situation has become all the more serious since 9/11. The theory which till now was a myth seems to have assumed an expression of naïve reality. As the conditions become intractable, the prediction of Friedrich Nietzsche appears to be moving in the direction that the German philosopher had predicted.

The questions of fundamentalism, clash of civilizations and global violence have become the core issues of the current phase of modern age. Since most of these issues pertain to the Muslim world, they perturb scholars and thinkers who are concerned to resolve the gravity of ideological confrontations. Since the collapse of the World Trade Center the West seems to have assumed increasingly an unbalanced and extremist stance against the Muslim world. Some of its extremist fanatics are turning to the tactics which their forefathers used to employ in the days of darkness. The environments in those days were conditioned not only by backward tribal chiefs, feudal lords and reactionary schools of thought; the Christian doctrines also caused a wave of degeneration in human conditions and socio-cultural environments. Since most of the events were determined by the reactionary lords and religious schools of thought, the conditions were not allowed to assume the colours and hues of healthy evolution and interaction. There were feuds, rivalries and clashes as we see today among fundamentalist, fanatic groups.

Hence the present-day events such as violence, terrorism and burning of the Qur’an are no less derogatory; they merit serious thought and action. The values of a pluralist and tolerant society are different from the code of life of a decadent society. Although modern western societies claim to be civilized and enlightened, yet such happenings give them a bad name

THE US ISLAMOPHOBIC COTTAGE INDUSTRY

And The QURAN BURNING IN AMERICA… By Iqbal Syed Hussain

Misconception of Islam in the West is the most disturbing phenomenon of the 21st century. With bias, bigotry and clashes this phenomenon has assumed ugly facets which have become the most pronounced features of the current Western perception of Islam. Confusion and confrontation, distortions and deviations have become the normal course of Western ideological interpretations and political actions.

Since 9/11 demonization of Islam in the West has assumed the dimensions of a cottage industry which continues to concoct the caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) and burn the holy book of QURAN. These are the fabrications and diabolical depictions which have nothing to do with the realities of religion and civilization. The latest developments have appeared in the destructive devices devised by a fanatic priest in Florida, who has burned the Holy Qur’an just to avenge his misconceptions and phobias caused by misinterpretations of Islam.

In the current age of anger and despair, tempers are let loose on the slightest pretext of misconceived perception without delving into the depth of realities. Probing and perceiving the true perspectives is a hard task which very few people undertake. At the same time on the Muslim front there are very few scholars and communicators who can convey the true meanings of Islam in a convincing and persuasive way. There is an acute dearth of refined literature and books on Islam which could be easily accessible to fanatics like Pastor Jones.

As an author of a couple of books on the QURAN I feel specially perturbed and condemn this horrific act in the strongest possible words. I have already written a number of books which illuminate the brilliant features of the QUR’AN. My books make it clear that ISLAM has nothing to do with extremism and terrorism. It is a religion of balance and moderation, peace and harmony. It needs to be understood rather than confronting in vicious and horrendous way. The US onslaughts against the Muslims whether in the form of drone attacks or desecration of the Holy Prophet and the Qur’an do not serve the cause of peace and understanding in the world. The pernicious perceptions have to be corrected and the course of inter-faith dialogue has to be pursued.

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In order to dilute the distorted essence of this “outrageous path of hatred”, we have produced a number of books which are oriented to creating a better understanding of Islam and pave way for mutual respect and interaction. The world cannot be perpetually pushed to a constant volley of clashes of civilizations as Professor Huntington visualized and propounded in his books. If not properly responded, the devices of the neo-cons and onslaughts of the extremists will go on polluting the environments and destabilizing the world. This is the wisdom of the scholars, the perception of the politicians and tolerance of common men that can rescues the humanity from the crusades of the so-called “Warriors of God” who very often appear as wolves and tigers intending to devour the innocent human beings around them. In our books we have established the humanistic credentials of Islam and paved way for responding to the misconceptions of the Western society and Christian theology. We have made it clear that the biggest loss is the loss of perception and the strongest response is the response of conversing and not colliding with other disciplines and religions.

For details please contact:

HUMANITY International

Tel: 0092-55-3842583