The Present
Crisi1s in Islam
And Our Future
Educational Programme
Dr. Muhammad Fazl-ur-Rahman
M.A.; B.Th. (Alig.); Hons. Theol.
An Original and Revolutionary Muslim Educational Scheme – The First
Attempt in response to Quaid-e-Azam’s historic appeal at Karachi for planning a
National System of Muslim Education – A Stirring Appeal to the Leaders of
Muslim Nation for “rescuing the Muslim Intelligentsia from the quagmire of
Intellectual Serfdom.”
To
My revered teacher
PROFESSOR SYED ZAFAR-UL-HASAN
M.A. (Alig.), D.Phil. (Oxon.), Dr. Phil. (Erl.)
At whose feet I learnt to understand
The problems of Philosophy
And to think on the problems of Muslim India
گفتند
جھان ما آیا بتومی سازد
گفتم
کہ نمی سازد، گفتند کہ برھم زن
Let
the war-cry of every Musulman be:--
Away
from Aristotle and Plato.
Away
from Plotinus and his hosts.
Away
from Mill and Marx.
Away
from the spiritual perversion of Nationalism.
Away
from The moral devastation of Capitalism.
Away
from The atheistic implication of Communism.
Away
from The effeminate mysticism of The Orient.
Away
from The hedonistic materialism of The Occident.
Away
from all these, and many other un-Islamic
and
anti-Islamic sign-posts of human history,
and---
Back
to Allah, The Author- of our existence, The
Author of Islam, The Author of The universe;
Back
to the Qur’anic stream of perennial life and light;
Back
to the world-leader Muhammad
(may
Allah's choicest blessings be with him for
all
Time To come !).
Dr.Fazlur Rahman Ansari رحمہ اللہ
CONTENTS
1.
Introduction
Why this Book? – Demand of Educational Autonomy.
2.
Nature
of The Present Crisis
Shortcomings of Conservatism – The ‘Progressive’ Musulmans –
Importance of the Intellectual Factor – Confusion and Chaos.
3.
Way
Out of The Crisis
Islamic Intellectual Renaissance – Instruments of Renaissance – A
National System of Muslim Education – Courses of Study – Double Process of
Islamisation of Education – Teachers – Research: its Aims and Function –
Verdict of Muslim History.
4.
A
Preliminary Chart of Muslim Education
5.
Our
First Step into The Future
Three Scheme for the Advancement of Islamic Research – Central
Islamic Research Academy – Four Islamic Research Fellowships in the Muslim
University – The Duty of the All-India Muslim Educational Conference.
6.
Last
Remarks
Some Objections Answered – A Final Appeal.
PREFACE
The educational ideology and scheme presented in these pages was
first evolved in 1938 when I was engages in tackling the problems of Islam in
south-eastern Asia, whither I had been sent on Islamic mission by the renowned
Muslim missionary, Shah Muhammad Abdul Alim Siddiqi. The sincere appreciation
which it received from the Muslim leaders there has encouraged me to submit it
to the leaders of Muslim India at this critical moment when the Indian Muslim
nation is in the throes of a new birth. I know I am a junior member of the
Islamic fold and possess therefore no right to dictate to the elders of the
nation, but knowing this I am presenting my thought in the hope that perchance
he elders might discern in it some element of value and perchance it may render
some service to Islam. I do not claim that my scheme is a great scheme like
those which have been presented by Muslim educationists from time to time.
Great schemes can come only from great educationists, and I am neither ‘great’
nor ‘educationist’. I however believe that it is an inevitable step in the
right direction.
For the last fifty years, the Muslim world has been rapidly and
constantly travelling away from the Islamic ideals, and, as Professor Karl
Becker once said, the Muslim peoples are trying to become more European than
Europeans themselves. This cultural de-Islamisation is a most dangerous
pathological symptom, and believing as I do with the great Islamic thinker,
Professor Syed Zafar-ul-Hasan, that the individual as well as national
salvation of the Musulmans lies in following the Sunnah of our Holy Prophet
peace be with him! , I feel that it is high time for the Muslim leaders to
strike the deadliest blows at the defeatist mentality and to strive with all
their might for rescuing the Muslim intelligentsia from the quagmire of
intellectual serfdom into which it has been thrown by the combined force of
political slavery and a general intellectual lethargy.
I request my Muslim readers to study the following pages with a
critical mind. I further request that those who may agree with me should fight
for the cause with all their might, while those who may disagree with me may
communicate to me their criticism. All those newspapers and journals which
may publish reviews may kindly send those reviews to me. My address is given
below.
I feel I should thank the Muslim University Muslim League, the
Aligarh Books-&-Newspapers Agency, and (particularly) Mr Ahmed Wahab Kheiri
who virtually dragged me into the field, - dragged, I say, because my
engrossment in the work of research could hardly allow me to devote full ten
days to this task.
FAZL-UR-RAHMAN
Wardern’s Residence,
Aftab Hostel,
Muslim University, Aligarh.
10th Muhurrum 1363.
7th January 1944.
متاع دین و دانش لٹ گئی اللہ والوں کی
یہ کس کافر ادا کا فتنہ خونریز ہے ساقی؟
نہ اُٹھا پھر کوئی رومی عجم کے لالہ زاروں سے
وھی آب و گل ایراں وھی تبریز ہے ساقی!
(اقبال)
الحمد للہ وحدہ، والصلوۃ والسلام علی من لا نبی
بعدہ
1
INTRODUCTION
WHY THIS BOOK?
In his Presidential Address delivered on
Friday, the 24th of December 1943, at the Karachi Session of the
All-India Muslim League, the beloved leader of Muslim India, Quaid-e-Azam
Mohammed Ali Jinnah, through whose statesmanship, political genius and
sincerity، Divine Grace rescued the Indian Musulmans
in the greatest political crisis of their history, while unfolding the
constructive programme for that great Muslim organization, emphasized the
necessity of planning a national system of Muslim education.
The present essay forms a humble contribution,
from one of his humble followers, to a fundamental discussion of that supremely
great problem, - the discussion in the first place of the intellectual
situation which exists in the world of Islam in general and in Muslim India in
particular, and secondly, of the bearing of this intellectual situation on our
future educational programme, and thirdly, of the preliminary ground-work which
has to be accomplished before any planning of a national system of Muslim
education can be possible.
I hold and believe that it is our present
theological and secular systems of education which are mainly responsible for
the creation of the present
intellectual-emotional crisis in the world of Islam. For, the theological
system has mostly helped only in preserving the interest of scholasticism and
has utterly failed in creating those leaders of thought who could keep the
banner of Islam aloft in the present universal clash of ideologies; while the
secular system has worked only for de-Islamising us culturally and has bestowed
upon us nothing more than a hybrid mélange in the intellectual domain. The need
of a new system of education is, therefore, imperative, but in evolving it we
shall have to keep in mind the all-important fact that no system of education
can be called Islamic unless it answers to the requirements of the present
situation and helps in building up not only a mighty Muslim state but also in
creating a great and vigorous Islamic civilization.
It is with this ideal that
the present essay which forms part of my book: The Process of Future Islamic
Revolution has been written but it is with some hesitation that it is being
released for publication. For, there is every probability that, coming as it
does from a humble Musulman, the voice raised in these pages might be lost in
the deafening din of popular slogans and the craze for popular programmes.
There is too much of confusion in the domain of our popular educational thought,
too much of ignorance of Islamic values among the masses, and too much of
escapism, of false sense of security, of misjudgment of values, of un-Islamic
modes of thought and action, in the upper strata of Muslim society. The
scientific vision which the Holy Quran had created in us has been almost
obliterated and the consequence is that we are now hardly fit to face realities
in a long-range and comprehensive view.
For long we have taken pride in planting our
national policies in the mirage of expediency, in trying to effect compromises
between irreconcilable opposites, in committing fallacies after fallacies with
a perfectly balanced state of mind, - and in laughing at those who point out
our inconsistency. What a tremendous waste of energy and what a great loss of
time and opportunity, for instance, Muslim India had to inflict upon itself
before it could become conscious of its ideal of Pakistan, - the only
ideal which, being in a most perfect harmony with the innermost aspirations of
its national soul, it could honestly possess and should have pursued from the
very beginning of its political struggle? And, if the present self-complacency
continues, it might again take a long time to become fully conscious of the
truth that Pakistan as a mere political ideal or even as a constitutional fact
shall remain meaningless unless our political emancipation goes hand in hand with
our moral regeneration, intellectual resurrection, social reformation, economic
stablilisation, and martial resuscitation, - in other words, unless we are able
to build up a powerful state which should be the nursery as well as the
fortress of Islamic culture and civilisation.
Such a task is indeed great and abounds with obstacles.
But the flame of faith which Islam imparts to every true Muslim can reduce the
mightiest obstacles to ashes, and the present essay has been written for those
in whose hearts it still burns with its pristine purity and original grandeur,
even as it burnt in the hearts of those, whose labour of love, in bygone days, made
Islam great as a religious community, a political power, a social order, and a
cultural achievement.
I am conscious of the fact that my frankness,
manifested at certain places in the present essay, might be objected to as
something uncalled-for. I might further be accused of bitterness. But I do not
wish to apologise. Frankness is always a virtue and especially so when we have
to choose between life and death. Bitterness is the natural product of
disappointments and failures, and there are more of disappointments and failures than the contrary in the
national life of the Musulmans, whether in India or outside. Anyone who takes
the trouble of analyzing the genesis of the slow but sure disintegration of our
cultural life will bear testimony to the truth of this statement.
In spite of this, however,
I do not mean to be dogmatic. I shall insist on nothing else than the
principle which I have advocated, and if my friends find any fallacies or
faults in my premises or conclusions, I shall be only too glad to accept their
amendments regarding the details. In the meanwhile I hope that Muslim India
will not sleep over the issue, but will strive with the full strength of its
moral fibre in a way worthy of a great nation.
DEMAND OF EDUCATIONAL AUTONOMY
Before I actually proceed with a discussion of
my main thesis, I may elucidate an important point. A very subtle objection
might be raised that the educational ideology presented in the forthcoming
pages is impossible of practical realization except in a free Muslim state
which does not yet exist in India and might take pretty long time to exist.
To such an objection I would reply that our
educational ideal can be achieved even if we succeed, for the present, only in
achieving Educational Autonomy for the Musulmans. In fact, if we assess
the present situation properly, it will become clear that such a demand should
take the foremost place in our constitutional struggle. For, he dissolution of
the present intellectual atmosphere, which is to a very large extent servile
and morbid, and the creation of a new Muslim intelligentsia, which may be
saturated with the spirit outlook and culture of Islam, seems to be a necessary
condition for achieving the great goal of creating a free Muslim India.
If I am right in reading the thought of Quaid-e-Azam,
the demand of Educational Autonomy is inherent in his recent emphasis on
planning a new system of Muslim national education. Indeed, this demand is an
immediate and crying need of the nation, and not only does time seem ripe for
it in view of the new ferment in the educational world which aims at a
re-planning of education in India, but it is a demand which, apart from its
inherent soundness and rationality, has some precedents in recent Muslim
history. For instance: The Muslim minority of Yugoslavia, which enjoys a
somewhat similar status as the Muslim nation of India, fought for and obtained
Educational Autonomy after the birth of the new Yugoslav state; similarly, Jamiat-ul-Mohammediyyeh,
the premier socio-religious Muslim organization of the East Indies, succeeded
to a large extent in wresting from Holland this great national right.
2
NATURE OF THE PRESENT CRISIS
The world of Islam is facing today a crisis
unprecedented in her history. A gigantic struggle is in progress between the forces
of medieval conservatism – misnamed ‘orthodoxy’ – and the so-called
‘progressive’ forces of scientific materialism radiated from the West. On the
outcome of this struggle seems to depend the future of Islam as a world-order
and a religion par excellence.
SHORCOMINGS OF CONSERVATISM[1]
The conservatives take their stand upon the
great and fundamental truth that the life of a Muslim must be governed solely
by the Quran and the Sunnah. But the defect in the angle of vision which they
adopt in the practical application of this principle transforms their very
strength into weakness. This defect consists in:
1. Their inability to appreciate the harmonious
blending of means and ends in the organic. Whole of Islam, which has resulted
in an undue emphasis on secondary externals to the entire forgetfulness
of the fact that character is always a unity and must be evolved from within;
2. Their virtual refusal to go beyond the
preliminary foundations of Islamic faith and practice, the adoption of an
obscurantist outlook, and the consequent culpable neglect in working out the
guidance of Islam on the burning problems of the present day.
This attitude has led them to commit blunders
in evaluating properly many a new situation, and ended in casting a slur on the
sacred name of orthodoxy, nay, in disparaging the very prestige of Islam in the
eyes of those who depend for their knowledge and appreciation of Islam on these
representatives.
Their utter failure in creating and evolving a
healthy and genuine Islamic civilisation, which could be a model for the world
at large, even in those countries where they wield political influence, as for
instance the Hijaz and Afghanistan, is a standing testimony of their
shortcomings.
THE
‘PROGRESSIVE’ MUSULMANS
The so-called ‘progressive’ Musulmans seek the
justification of their ideology in the short-comings of conservatism. They are
the product of that spirit of intellectual defeatism which followed fast upon
the heels of Islam’s political land-slide in the nineteenth century. For them
Islam is only one of the many religious systems and deserves respect merely as
a social symbol or as a historical legacy; it is at best a personal (= private)
faith, meant to comfort and sustain the individual, and capable of being set in
any cultural framework they choose. They are vehemently opposed to the idea
that Islam is a discipline, a way of life, a self-contained culture, and a
self-sustained civilisation.
This ‘progressive’ view of Islam is not the
product of any intellectual appreciation of the Quran and the Sunnah, but of
the spirit of slavish submission to Western norms and ideals. It began in the
adoption of Western dress and manners and the creation of the pseudo-rational
apologetics of the nineteenth century and has culminated today in the cultural
and intellectual apostasy of a fairly large section of Muslim intelligentsia.
And in truth it could not have been otherwise. The new current of Western
thought was not confronted with the vigorous and powerful Islam of the Quran
and the Sunnah but with an outworn and moribund medieval scholasticism.
Few of us, however, realize the tremendous
havoc which the many-faced impact of Western culture has caused to the Muslim
world. Still less do we realize the doom which must inevitably befall Islam if
the present self-complacency and senselessness of its upholders continues.
It is a fact known even to the man in the
street that the majority of our rising intellects are not only ignorant of
Islam but, because of this ignorance and the powerful impact of anti-Islamic
influences, positively antagonistic towards its ideals. The phenomenon of some
of our best youths succumbing to the fashionable materialistic socio political
creeds of the West, as for instance Marxism, is now of daily occurrence. It may
be a transitory phase; but it is there all the same.
It is not, however, individuals only who are
deserting our cause. The poison has percolated into the very hearts of Musulman
governments. Typical in this respect is the case of modern Turkey, where a
radical divorce from the Quranic ideals has been effected not only in the
externals of culture, in social outlook, in political policy, but also in intellectual
and religious life. The last links with the Islamic cultural past have been
brutally broken by abolishing the Islamic code of law and the Arabic script –
the script which enshrines the Islamic past of the race and which is the
international script of Muslim Asia, Africa and Europe --, and adopting in
their stead the German, Swiss and Italian codes and the Latin alphabet,
forgetting in the blind fury of revolutionary spirit that nothing is more
national than the law and the history of a people.
IMPORTANCE OF
THE INTELLECTUAL FACTOR
Who is responsible for this deterioration of
Islamic religious life and disintegration of Islamic culture order?
The enemies of Islam attribute the
responsibility to Islam itself.
The Musulmans, in their turn, generally refer
it to Islam’s political breakdown – to their political servitude --, so much so
that it has been possible for the Congressite Musulmans of India to deceive
themselves that the mere liberation of India from the foreign yoke, without any
separate sovereign political and cultural rights for Islam, will by itself be
enough to restore the fast fading glory of the faith.
The first is at best an a priori
contention and collapses as soon as it is brought to face the evidence of the
Quran, the Sunnah, and Islamic History.
The second contention is a half-truth. It
is true in the sense that political subjection does bring in its wake a
sort of intellectual inferiority-complex – a spirit of intellectual defeatism
--, especially when the intellectual level of the ruling nation is higher than
they of the subject race. It is more than true in the positive sense
that political freedom of the Muslim peoples is an essential condition for the
ultimate dissolution of the anti-Islamic trends and the re-stablisation of the
Islamic world-order, in which sense the establishment of Pakistan is an
absolute and unavoidable necessity in India. But it is not true inasmuch
as our political breakdown itself is the effect produced by some other
more fundamental factor.
An empirical test of this view lies in the
fact that the restoration and consolidation of political power in several
Muslim countries has not in itself contributed in any appreciable degree to a
revival of the Islamic world-order. In fact, in certain cases, as for instance
in Turkey and Iran, quite the contrary has happened. Political consolidation
and evolution has brought greater opportunities to the anti-Islamic forces.
To seek a solution of our present tragedy in
the political emancipation alone would, therefore, be a blunder of the
first magnitude, and those who might take an exclusively political view
of our destiny and believe that a mere symbol of political autonomy, in the
present state of panacea, may be reminded that in the very midst of the
struggle our youths are forsaking our hope and the ghost of skepticism haunts
the hitherto impregnable fortresses of our faith.
Consequently, while acknowledging that our
political breakdown has contributed greatly to the present crisis, we should
not blind ourselves to the importance of other basic factors, among which he
most fundamental is our Intellectual Collapse, which snatched away from
the hands of Islam the right to educate us and to transform us into super-men
and soldiers of the Kingdom of God. Our national existence has in consequence
come to resemble a tree whose roots have been washed bare by the mighty torrent
of Western civilisation: and the tree is slowly withering, decaying and
collapsing for want of proper nourishment.
CONFUSION AND
CHAOS
All of us probably realize the intellectual backwardness
of the Muslim world, particularly in the field of Science, but few of us have
cared to evaluate our horrifying ignorance of Islamic values and our
intellectual bankruptcy in the creative realm.
An overwhelming majority of our old school
seen to have forfeited all creative genius and take pride merely in employing
and considering as final a technique evolved by the writers of the sixth
and seventh centuries of our era, who lived in an atmosphere and under
circumstances in many respects different from our own.
The reaction against it has given rise o an
ever-increasing loose-thinking and skepticism. The modernized educated
Musulmans, with few honourable exceptions, learn their faith and their past
national history from Western orientalists – Goldzihers and Nicholsons and
Margoliouths and Macdonalds – who paint Islam in the blackest colours. Even
when they venture to come out of that vicious circle, the bias for Westernism
persists and the demi-gods of Western thought continue to keep them in thrall.
The confusion thus created has landed us
intellectually at the cross-roads. On the one hand, there is a new-fangled
trend of modern materialism and scepticism which is leading us straight into
the arms of apostasy. On the other hand, there is a trend which seeks to steer
a middle course between Islam and modern Western ideals, thus assuming that
black and white are the same colour and consequently degenerating into an
exceedingly unedifying grey: there is a large proportion of this ‘grey’ belief
in the ranks of the westernized Musulmans. There is a third trend, less
vigorous than the rest of the two but quite alive among the general masses, ---
the trend, namely, which refuses to come out of the intellectual atmosphere of
eight hundred years ago and disdains to form a contact with modern problems.
All these three trends will lead us to
disaster or – might we not more truly say ---, have actually landed us in
disaster. The storm in the world of Islam is in full swing!
3
WAY OUT OF THE
CRISIS:
ISLAMIC
INTELLECTUAL RENAISSANCE
The storm of un-Islamic and anti Islamic
forces is in full swing in the world of Islam, creating confusion and chaos all
around and penetrating even the most hidden recesses of Muslim national life.
But shall this
be our end?
It should not be: It must not be: It cannot
be.
It should not be because an immense
majority of Muslims all over the world still retain an absolute faith in the
redeeming powers of Islam.
It must not be because Islam still
possesses those infinite potentialities which can avert the mightiest
catastrophe.
It cannot be because humanity, in spite
of all her progress in science and philosophy, has not yet out-grown Islam.
What is needed today is an ardent faith, a
firm resolve, an intelligent move, in the direction of the Reconstruction of
the Basis of our Intellectual Life, even as the Emmanuel Kant of Muslim
history, Imam Abu Hamid Muhammad Al-Ghazzali, tried to accomplish to a certain
extent in his own day.
By thus emancipating our intellect from the
serfdom of the West and all other un-Islamic and anti-Islamic influences, we
shall be able to lay the foundations of an Islamic Intellectual Renaissance,
which in its turn will contribute to the generation of the forces required for
bringing about our moral regeneration. And moral regeneration will form a
genuine guarantee not only for the restoration of our political power but also
against the repetition of the present tragedy.
INSTRUMENTS FOR BRINGING ABOUT THE ISLAMIC
INTELLECTUAL RENAISSANCE
In lying down a programme for our future
intellectual struggle, a distinction must be made at the very outset between
two different concepts, namely, ‘Islamic Intellectual Revival’ and ‘Revival of
Muslim Learning’. The first concept is fundamentally ‘religious’ and
consequently comprehensive. The second is fundamentally ‘secular’ and
consequently partial. The foregoing analysis of the intellectual aspect of the
present crisis makes it clear that our effort should be based primarily and
essentially on the first concept.
The ideal in undertaking such a task should be
four-fold:---
1. To eliminate all anti-Islamic elements from
our intellectual life;
2. To impart to the intellectual aspect of our
national existence a true and positive Islamic character by creating a distinct
and powerful Islamic thought which may fundamentally cover all branches
of knowledge;
3. To ensure and conserve our Intellectual
Self-sufficiency;
4. To bridge up the gulf and resolve the conflict
which exists today between ‘theological’ and ‘secular’ education, even as our
ancestors did in the heyday of Islamic civilisation, thus allowing to Islam the
opportunity for its full and rich expression in our intellectual life, which
expression should finally become the bedrock for raising up the mighty edifice
of our distinct civilisation.
This task is indeed immense and huge and might
create a frown on the foreheads of those who are accustomed to be always and
invariably pleased with short-cuts. But I would solicit their permission to
point out that this task has become a religious duty for us today and cannot be
shirked. To shirk it, to belittle it, or even to delay it would be fatal. For
the anti-Islamic thought-waves which are attacking the weather-beaten and
neglected boat of Islam are formidable and swift.
The instruments for achieving the ideal
outlined above are two (not necessarily arranging them in order of merit herein
below):---
A. A National System of Muslim Education;
B. Large-scale and High-class Research.
Let us take them up and discuss them one by
one.
(A)
A NATIONAL SYSTEM OF MUSLIM EDUCATION
Education, for the Musulmans, should have
three ends (without for the time-being going into a detailed classification of
the elements comprehended by each end):---
1. The development of the individual on Islamic
lines, or, in other words, the creation of true Islamic character in its
manifold aspects;
2. General intellectual development of the
highest order;
[N.B. – I might make a passing reference to
those who regard intellectual culture as an end-in-itself. Such an ideal is, in
the first place, partial, in the second place, false, in the third place,
dangerous, especially for a nation like ours which is entangled in a
life-and-death struggle and is thirsting for the realization of its
world-ideal. Intellectual Culture may rightly be conceived, not as an
end-in-itself, but as an end sub-serving a higher end; and the higher end, for
he Musulman, is Islam.]
3. All round professional development (which
includes Medicine, Engineering, etc.), especially the cultivation of Applied
Science, which is absolutely necessary for making a nation materially great and
powerful in the present industrial age.
The blending of these three ends will give us
a distinct system of education.
The working of that system shall require – as
every educational system does require – two instruments of a specific type, ---
the type which answers to the requirements of the ideal outlined above. These
two instruments are:---
1. Courses of Study and the text-books used
therefore;
2. Teachers.
The success of the system, both from the
Islamic and the purely educational point of view, shall depend upon the type of
these instruments.
The character which these two instruments
should possess can be considered from two different points of view, namely, (1)
Islamic, and (2) Academic.
I shall not discuss the academic aspect here
because such a discussion lies outside the scope of the present essay.
Hence, taking up the Islamic aspect alone, let
us proceed with a scientific analysis and evaluation.
(1)
Courses of Study
Viewing the Courses of Study first:---What
method shall we have to adopt and introduce to give them a distinct Islamic
character so that they may serve the great Islamic ideal outlined above?
The popular method which has been employed so
far is what I call the Patchwork Method. It consists in introducing the
Islamic element into the system of modern education, in the form of the
inclusion of a compulsory course of ‘theology’ in the curriculum of studies.
But I may be allowed to say, though I may
perhaps seek pardon of conservative Muslim educationists in saying this, that
in actual practice, this method has not only failed ignominiously but has by a
curious irony of fate, become a positive force for fostering a dissatisfaction
against Islam. (This second contention might sound strange, but it can be
argued on the basis of hard facts).
This method has failed, not merely because of
the rotten character of the syllabus of theological study prescribed in the
Muslim institutions of secular education, but also because – and this cause is fundamental
– of an inherent conflict to which such a method must obviously give birth.
The conflict comes in because of the existence
of an acute dualism in the educational scheme, with a most powerful current of
un-Islamic and, in many respects, anti-Islamic thought, on the one hand, and a
feeble divergent current of so-called ‘theology’, on the other.
Some Muslim educationists have been suggesting
of late that the morbid condition can be cured by raising up the standard of
the present text-books of theology. They lose sight of the truth that such a
procedure, under the present educational conditions, will magnify and intensify
the conflict, rather than resolve it.
DOUBLE PROCESS OF ISLAMISATION
The only way for resolving the conflict, in my
opinion, is to make Islam the basis of our education and to forsake permanently
the policy of making it a side-show.
To realize this end we shall have to plan our
courses of study anew, basing our work on the following ideas:---
(1)
The period of primary education is the most important
period in the intellectual and moral life of man. The impressions which a child
receives and the cast into which his mind is moulded at this stage prove to be
of abiding nature in most cases. It seems necessary therefore to concentrate
our educational struggle in this stage on giving to Muslim children the best
possible grounding in Islam.
(2)
In the later stages of education, neither the inclusion
of an elementary course of ‘compulsory theology’ not the addition of a full
fledged course of ‘optional theology’ as nowadays current, can serve our ideal
of maintaining a basic uniformity of character on Islamic lines. The
proper method would, therefore, be to adopt a double process of Islamisation
of education, it being taken for granted that education must include all
those modern subjects which are being taught nowadays in the secular Muslim
educational institutions.
The double process will consist in:---
(a)
A graduated course of Islamics, including the
Arabic language;
(b)
The creation of a Muslim Point of View in all the
subjects taught, in whatever measure necessary and possible in the different
stages of the growth of our education under the new scheme.
Both these points need a little
elucidation:---
(a)
Let me emphasise at the very outset that by a
‘Graduated Course of Islamics’, I do not mean a course of ‘theology’ as taught
in the theological institutions of India. For, in my scheme of education, the
proper place for such a course is in the stage of special studies. The course
of Islamics, on the other hand, which I advocate is a compulsory course which
is to be adopted in all stages of education – primary, secondary ad higher.
Such a compulsory course of Islamics should be
of a type which should help:---
(i)
To mould the morals of the Muslim youths according to the
Islamic pattern;
(ii)
To create in the Muslim youths an un-conquerable faith in
the future destiny of their great nation and to evolve in them the practical
commonsense which may enable them to judge their present and future in the
perspective of their past history;
(iii)
To create an Islamic intellectual background according o
the requirements of the intellectual atmosphere of the modern age, with a view
to make our youths immune from the storm of scepticism;
(iv)
To give them an all-round grounding in Islam, in order
that their intellectual expression in later life may proceed on Islamic lines
and in order that ultimately the spiritual and moral faculties of the Muslim
nation may be rescued from the state of sterile tranquility into which they
have been thrown.
With this view, the proposed Course of
Islamics shall include:---
(i)
The Spiritual, Moral, Social, Economic and Political
teaching of Islam, classified and stated according to modern canons of thought
and expression;
(ii)
Islamic History viewed in its full comprehensives;
(iii)
Arabic Language---
all the component parts of the course
graduated according to the different stages of education.
(b)
The second point is based on a
socio-philosophical truism that the poisonous gas of inferiority-complex with
which the atmosphere of the present-day Muslim world is saturated must be
neutralized before we can even dream of building up a great future for Islam.
Europe was confronted with a similar problem
when the intellectual forces which the Muslim world was generating had opened
for her the gates of an intellectual renaissance. She solved that problem in a
way which, if it is legitimate for the Muslims to imitate her, is one of those
things which they would do well to imitate. Europe received the scientific
method and many other elements of thought and culture, besides the intellectual
legacy of Greece, from the Muslims, but she took the greatest care to give to
her intellectual movement a distinct stamp of her own, and in doing so went so
far as to be ungrateful to her Muslim benefactors by making a strenuous effort
for effacing the last traces of Muslim influences and by suppressing he
recognition of the part played by them in her cultural history. She planned her
scheme of the Intellectual Renaissance by linking up her ‘present’ with the
Greek and Roman ‘past’, thus creating that pride in the minds of her future
generations which, though, in its baser aspects, it has resulted in doing
injury and bringing misery to the rest of the world, has proved very beneficial
for her in many ways.
The idea underlying the two concepts mentioned
above, namely, the creation of a Muslim background, and, the evolution of a
Muslim point of view, must, I hope, be clear now. But let me elucidate the two concepts
in concrete terms.
The creation of a Muslim background
means:---
(i)
Making the Islamic teaching the basic ground work in such
subjects in which it is possible to do so, as, for instance, Philosophy of
Religion, Philosophy of History, Moral Philosophy, politics, Economics, etc ;
(ii)
The linking up of our present renaissance with our
intellectual past by reviving in the fullest measure the Muslim contribution to
the various do mains of knowledge – encompassing our whole past intellectual
struggle from the very beginning of Islam -, thus creating a Historical
Continuity in our national intellectual life;
(iii)
The assimilation of this past contribution in the
curriculum of our education in a most suitable manner.
The evolution of a Muslim point of view
will be possible only gradually:
In
the first stage:
By allowing the fundamental Islamic values to
react on our study of different branches of knowledge;
In
the second stage:
By studying the different possibilities of the
interpretation of facts in each problem which we may confront;
In
the third stage:
By adopting and developing by further research
an interpretation which is most in harmony with the Islamic fundamental values.
There is a likely misunderstanding which I may
anticipate here and remove. By the last two factors in my scheme for the
evolution of a Muslim point of view, I do not mean that scientific facts should
be distorted or that science should be manufactured to serve the ends of Islam,
which procedure is neither necessary nor honest.
That the evolution of a Muslim point of view is
not an unscientific ideal can be understood by referring, by way of
illustration, to two schools of the science of Psychology, namely, the
Behaviourist school of the materialists and the Hormic school of the idealists.
These schools are radically opposed to each other in their ultimate
conclusions, but, in spite of that disparity, one is as scientific as the
other.
(2) Teachers
While discussing the instruments of education
in the beginning of this chapter, I enumerated two: (1) Courses of Study, (2)
Teachers. Having finished with the Courses of Study, we may now come to the
problem of Teachers.
The idea of the creation of a new type of
teachers is inherent in the very ideal of evolving a new system of education
which should serve an end fundamentally richer and in many respects different
from the present one. The validity of such an idea, therefore, does not require
a discussion for its proof. What we have to aim at here in the limited scope of
the present introductory essay is to try to fix the type needed.
It should of course be evident to all that the
first quality which the persons selected for the job should possess is their
ability to teach their subjects according to the Islamic requirements of the
new scheme.
But this quality shall have to be supplemented
with another, which is in a way more fundamental if the ultimate ideal of our
education is to be successfully achieved. This other quality may be described
by saying that, as a class of Muslim intellectuals and teachers of the nation,
they should be those true sons and daughters of Islam who move and have
their being in the perennial sunshine of an unconquerable faith and a pure
intellectual vision, ---those who may possess he fire of the missionary zeal
and the proper mental equipment for healing the intellectual cancer of the
nation.
Neither those faithless Intellectual
Perverts whose minds roam perpetually in the dark shadows of
inferiority-complex and away from the light of Islam, not those incorrigible intellectual
Pacifists whose interest in Islam is divorced from the ideal of service,
can run the new scheme.
(B)
RESEARCH
Having now
finished with one instrument of the Islamic Intellectual Renaissance, let us
proceed to the second.
The problem of
Research should have come first in our discussion, for it actually forms the
first step in the materialization of the fundamental idea of Islamic
Intellectual Renaissance. But it has been taken up after the discussion of the
problem of education because in that discussion alone its function and scope
could have become clear.
In that discussion
we have discovered the preliminary and basic work which shall have to be
accomplished before we are actually able to introduce a new system of
education.
This work in
its basic aspect will aim at:---
1st stage:--
(i)
The restoration of our Intellectual Equilibrium
and the creation of a new type of Muslim intellectuals who should be fit to run
the new scheme of education with absolute faithfulness to the ideals outlined.
(ii)
The creation of a Muslim background and the
evolution of a Muslim point of view in the different branches of
knowledge.
2nd stage:--
(iii)
Planning of the Course of Study and preparation of
suitable textbooks for different stages of the proposed type of
education.
The accomplishment of such a mighty task will
essentially require the creation of a powerful Intellectual Movement, which
must in its basic ground-work take the form of a large-scale,
well-organised, fully-coordinated and high-class Research.
The practical
form which this idea of Research should take is the establishment of a Central
Islamic Research Academy – preferably, either at Hyderabad or at Aligarh.
As a basic
ground-work of the proposed Intellectual Movement, the work of the Academy
should by graded into two distinct stages.
Work in the
first stage may be broadly
classified into the following items:---
1. To evolve a religion philosophy of Islam[2] for
giving a new orientation to the basis of our intellectual life and for meeting
the attacks of scientific materialism launched against religious verities in
general and against the Islamic transcendental values in particular;
2. To attempt an accurate and scientific
formulation of the Islamic solution of the various social (including economic
and political) and ethical problems which afflict humanity today;
N.B.---These two items of work shall require
extensive research in the Holy Quran, the Traditions of our Holy Prophet (peace
be with him!), the Muslim Law and Jurisprudence, and the whole sweep of Muslim
as well as Modern religious, philosophical, social and ethical thought.
3. To study, compile and interpret Islamic
History in a thoroughly scientific and comprehensive way;
4. To unearth the treasures of Muslim
contribution to knowledge buried in the ancient manuscripts, and thus to build
up our half-forgotten past and to link it up with the present.
Work in the second stage, shall consist of:---
1. Planning of the Subjects of Study, and,
2. Compilation of the required type of
text-books,---
on the basis of the work accomplished in the
first stage.
VERDICT OF MUSLIM HISTORY
Before
proceeding further, I may anticipate and reply an important objection. Some
might protest that my idea of adopting a long-range policy and of completing an
elaborate work of Research before attempting to plan and introduce a sound
system of Muslim national education is too far-fetched to deserve any serious
consideration.
In reply I
would respectfully submit that the alternative policy of adopting popular
remedies and shortcuts cannot pay in the long run and has actually proved the
ruin of Islam and Musulmans in the past. And this view of mine is not only
negatively grounded in the verdict of the last five hundred years of the
history of our decadence but is also positively supported by the voices of our
great reformers – the voice of Khairuddin Barbarosa, whose plea for reforming
the House of Islam on the basis of a long-range policy, made at the fateful
hour when the Christian flood, gathering at the gates of Islam, was preparing
to sweep off the Muslim countries of Europe, Asia, and Africa, failed in
penetrating the sterile brains of a corrupt Muslim administration; the voice of
Mustafa Fazil Pasha, whose Reform Manifesto, submitted to the Sublime Porte for
checking the Western tide with a comprehensive constructive programme, was
dynamited by the reactionary forces of the lethargy of an indolent people under
the smoke-screen of a false plea for protecting the rights of conservatism; the
voice of Syed Jemaluddin Afghani, whose masculine efforts of administering the
antidote against disruption and for revitalizing the body-politic of Islam by a
constructive process, were undermined by the self-seeking Musulman exploiters
of Islam; the voice of Prince Said Halim Pasha, whose clarion call for the
Islamisation (Islamlashmaq) of the collective life of the Muslim peoples
under the Caliphate, at a time when the sapping influences of Turanian
nationalism were still in their infancy in Turkey and could be nipped in the
bud, fell on the deaf ears of a self-conceited scholasticism and was lost –
voices, all of them sublime and heroic and great; voices, all of them still
alive and reverberating, though in mournful tones, in the pulsations of the throbbing
hearts of genuine lovers of Islam and can therefore pronounce the verdict.
4
A PRELIMINARY
CHART OF MUSLIM
EDUCATION
Many alternative
scheme of Muslim education, developed from different angles of view, are
concealed behind the horizon of the future, and among them I hope that the
scheme of that silent Islamic worker, Dr. Afzal Husain Qadri, who has been
engaged in that work for some time past and has already published a valuable
monograph on Primary Education, will form an important contribution to Muslim
Educational thought. In the meanwhile, I may present my own outline of a
possible system of Muslim national education, for consideration by Muslim
educationists in general and by Dr. Afzal Husain Qadri in particular, and for
improvement, if the scheme has any element of value, in the light of a
comparative study of the educational systems evolved in the different countries
of the world.
The following
preliminary chart is reproduced here, with certain minor changes and with
omission of the introductory portion, which has been already incorporated
in this book in a more detailed form in the foregoing chapters, from a
Memorandum submitted by me in 1938 to the late-lamented His Highness Sultan Sir
Muhammad Iskander Shah, ruler of the federated Malay state of Perak, for adoption,
first, in the educationally-neglected Muslim country of Malaya and, later on,
by the still more backward Muslim populations of the Pacific, as for instance,
the Muslim kingdom of Mindanao in the Philippine group:---
1. Education (basic) should be universal in
obedience to the demands of Islam.
2. The idea of dividing the education of
Musulmans into ‘religious’ and ‘non-religious’ should be permanently discarded,
for the conception of ‘religion’ in Islam embraces life in its totality. All
education becomes ‘religious’ for the Musulman the moment it is made to serve
Islam for the realization of its world-ideal.
3. All courses of study should be Islamised by
teaching every ‘secular’ subject with the Muslim background and the Islamic
point of view and by combining the ‘secular’ studies with a compulsory course
of Islamics, which should form the largest portion of study in the primary
stage.
4. The compulsory course of Islamics should be
taught in Urdu upto the secondary stage, and in Arabic in the highest stages.
5. While the function of the compulsory course of
Islamics shall be to mould the whole intellectual and moral outlook of an
educated Musulman according to the Islamic pattern, and to impart a
comprehensive knowledge of Islamic values, which will help in resolving the
present tragic ‘class-struggle’ between ‘Mulla-ism’ and ‘Secular-ism’, the
necessity of having high-class specialists in Islamics, as we have in other
subjects, shall remain. For that purpose, it will be necessary to plan
comprehensive and heavy courses of study, to limit admission to those courses
only to the most intelligent and conscientious, and to confer the honourable
title of ‘theologian’ only after the stage of research, thus eliminating, on
the one hand, that type of ill-equipped theologian which has done more
disservice than service to Islam, and creating, on the other hand, that right
type which may take up its rightful role of the leadership of the nation.
6. Education should be free and compulsory
upto the secondary stage and cheap and optional in the higher stages.
7. The same importance should be attached to the
education of women as to that of men.
8. There should be separate institutions for boys
and girls, in conformity with the cultural values of Islam.
9. In prescribing the courses of study and in
preparing the text-books, the fundamental idea must be kept in mind that
education must help each sex to evolve its individuality on its own distinct
lines, so that Muslim men and women may be able to act their rightful roles in
the drama of life and help towards creating that balanced society which it is
the mission of Islam to create.
10. Physical Culture should enjoy an important
place in the Muslim educational institutions and every means should be adopted
for creating and preserving a martial character in the Muslim youths according
to the demands of Islam.
11. Medium of instruction should be Urdu – the lingua
franca and cultural repository of Muslim India.
12. Education may be broadly divided into three
stages:---
(i)
The Stage of General Study, --- spread over a period of fourteen years
and commencing at the age of four.
This stage may be sub-divided into three:---
(a)
Infant Stage – spread over a period of the first two years;
(b)
Primary Stage – covering the next six years.
(c)
Secondary Stage – covering the last six years.
Education in the Secondary stage may be fixed
in three different types:---
(1)
Academic;
(2)
Commercial;
(3)
Technical.
Technical education may again be of two
different types:---
(a)
pertaining to Crafts;
(b)
pertaining to Agriculture.
(ii)
The Stage of Special Study, --- spread over a period of six years,
except in the case of Islamics in which the period should be eight years.
This stage may further be sub-divided into two
sub-stages of variable duration for the study of different courses.
(iii)
The Stage of Research, --- minimum period two years.
13. In the first stage, the following
subjects may be taught:---
(a)
Infant Education
The function of
Infant Education should be to acclimatize children in the atmosphere of education
by means of educative games and recreation. There should be no book-work.
Students should, however, be taught to repeat suitable hymns in praise of God
and poems in praise of the Holy Prophet (peace by with him!), and anecdotes
from the lives of Muslim national heroes – all of an innocent and simple moral
type.
(b)
Primary Education
(i)
Teaching of the Urdu language with the subject-matter of
the text-books comprising of Islamic tenets and morals, our Holy Prophet’s
biography, an historical anecdotes.
(ii)
Learning portions of the Holy Quran, preferably the small
chapters, by heart, combined with learning of prayers.
(iii)
Arithmetic.
(iv)
Hygiene.
(v)
Crafts.
N.B. --- (i) Subjects
nos. (i) and (ii) should form the largest portion of study.
(ii) A
distinction must be made between the different tastes of boys and girls in
teaching crafts.
(iii) For
those who wish to become Hafiz of the Holy Quran, a course of Hifz
may be combined with subjects nos (iii) and (iv) and a lighter course of
subject No. (i) above.
(c)
Secondary Education
(1)
Academic
For Boys:---
(i)
Islamics – as defined elsewhere.
N.B. --- The
function of the subject of Civics in modern secondary education will be
taken over by the more comprehensive subject of Islamics.
(ii)
Arabic Language.
(iii)
Urdu.
(iv)
Arithmetic.
(v)
English.
(vi)
History of India.
(vii)
Geography – World.
(viii)
Science – Physics, Chemistry, Botany, Zoology – A popular
treatment.
For Girls:---
(i)
Islamics.
(ii)
Arabic Language.
(iii)
Urdu.
(iv)
English.
(v)
An Outline of Indian History and World Geography.
(vi)
Arithmetic.
(vii)
Domestic Science and Hygiene.
(viii)
Science – Physics, Chemistry, Botany, Zoology – A popular
treatment.
(2)
Commercial
(i)
Islamics.
(ii)
Arabic Language.
(iii)
Urdu.
(iv)
English.
(v)
Arithmetic.
(vi)
Commerce.
(3)
Technical
(a)
Crafts (b) Agriculture.
(i)
Islamics.
(ii)
Arabic Language.
(iii)
Urdu.
(iv)
Arithmetic.
(v)
English.
(vi)
Crafts, or, Agriculture.
N.B. --- Different types of crafts should be
selected for boys and girls, keeping in view their respective functions in
life.
The
crafts for the girls should be such that they may develop them later into
home-industries, while the training of boys should be of a type which may
enable them to enter factory-life.
(14) In the second stage, education may
be specialized into different faculties, namely:---
i.
Faculty of Islamics
The
following eighteen subjects may be taught in this faculty:---
(a)
Quran and allied subjects.
(b)
Hadith and allied subjects.
(c)
Fiqh.
(d)
History of Fiqh.
(e)
Islamic Jurisprudence.
(f)
Arabic Language and Literature.
(g)
Islamic History.
(h)
History of Muslim Thought.
(i)
Islamic Political Theory and Practice.
(j)
Islamic Economics (theory and practice).
(k)
Comparative Religion.
(l)
Philosophy of Religion.
(m)
An outline of non-Muslim (mostly Western) Philosophical
Thought.
(n)
Non-Muslim Jurisprudence.
(o)
Persian Language.
(p)
English Language.
(q)
German Language.
(r)
French Language.
ii.
Faculty of Arts
The following subjects may be taught in this
faculty:---
Group 1:--
Philosophy,
Politics, Economics, History, Sociology, Mathematics, Domestic Science (for
women only), Education (for women only).
Group 2:--
Urdu,
Arabic, Persian, Sanscrit, English, German, French, and some other languages,
e.g., Turkish, Malay, Chinese – all the three spoken by large Muslim
populations--, if he Muslim educationists so choose.
Group 3:--
Commerce – Accountancy, Book-keeping,
Short-hand, Type-writing, etc.
Group 4:--
Law, --- having the same subjects as now
taught to the L.L.B. students.
Group 5:--
Journalism.
iii.
Faculty of Science
The following subjects may be taught in this
faculty:---
Physics, Chemistry, Botany, Zoology, Geography
with Geology, Mathematics.
iv.
Faculty of Engineering
Civil, Electrical, Mechanical, and Industrial
Engineering.
v.
Faculty of Agriculture
vi.
Faculty of Medicine
Muslim System of Medicine (mis-named ‘Unani’),
Allopathy, Homeopathy and Bio-Chemistry.
vii.
Faculty of Education
The function of this faculty shall be to train
teachers for the different stages and the different branches of education.
(15) (a) The study of Islamics may be planned
according to two stages, each stage covering a period of four years:--
1st Stage
Subjects
to be taught are:
(i)
Quran and allied subjects.
(ii)
Hadith and allied subjects.
(iii)
Fiqh.
(iv)
Islamic Jurisprudence.
(v)
History of Fiqh.
(vi)
Arabic Language and Literature.
(vii)
Islamic History.
(viii)
English Language.
2nd Stage
Subjects
to be taught are:
(i)
History of Muslim Thought.
(ii)
Islamic Political Theory and Practice.
(iii)
Islamic Economics Theory and Practice.
(iv)
Non-Muslim Jurisprudence.
(v)
Comparative Religion.
(vi)
Philosophy of Religion.
(vii)
An outline of non-Muslim Philosophical Thought.
(viii)
Languages: Persian, French, German.
(b) Study in the faculty of Arts may be
planned according to two stages, the first stage covering a period of four
years and the second stage covering a period of two years.
Students who
pass the final examinations in the subjects relating to Groups (1) and (2)
shall be eligible for taking up the course of Law (Group 4), or the course of
Journalism (Group 5) – each course covering a period of two years.
Islamics as
well as English will be compulsory in the first stage, while Islamics and
German, or French, or Persian will be compulsory in the second stage.
(c) Study in the faculty of Science may be
planned according to two stages, the first stage covering a period of four
years and the second stage covering a period of two years.
Islamics
as well as English will be compulsory in the first stage, while Islamics and
German or French, in the second stage.
(d)
(e) There may be two types of the courses of study in the
faculties of Engineering and Agriculture:
(i)
Ordinary
The courses of study falling under this head
shall cover a period of four years.
More attention shall be paid to ‘Practice’
than to ‘Theory’ in these courses.
(ii)
Higher
The courses of study falling under this head
shall cover a period of six years.
The first two years shall form a preparatory
stage in which pure sciences – Physics, Chemistry, Mathematics, in the case of
Engineering courses, and Physics, Chemistry, Botany, in the case of Agriculture
courses – will be taught.
More attention shall be paid to ‘Theory’ than
to ‘Practice’ in these courses.
A compulsory course of Islamics and English
shall be combined with the ‘ordinary’ as well as the ‘higher’ courses.
(f) There may be two types of the courses of
study in the Medical faculty:--
(i)
Ordinary
The courses of study falling under this head
shall cover a period of four years and shall prepare students for two
professions:--
(a)
Junior Physicians;
(b)
Manufacturers of Medicines.
(ii)
Higher
The courses of study falling under this head
shall cover a period of six years.
The
first two years shall form the period of the preparatory stage in which
Physics, Chemistry, and Biology will be taught.
The
standard of teaching the subjects of Medicine will be higher than in the
‘Ordinary’ stage, and effort will be made to create an insight in the subjects
and prepare students for research.
A
compulsory course of Islamics and English shall be combined will the ‘ordinary’
as well as the ‘higher’ courses.
N.B.--- A one year Practical Course for Compounders
and Surgical Assistants may also be included in the Medical Faculty.
(g) Students joining the faculty o Education
shall specialize in different sets of subjects ad for the following different
grades:--
Grade A
Students who
have passed the final examination of secondary education shall be trained in
this grade for teaching in primary institutions.
Grade B
Students who
have passed the first sub-stage of higher (special) education shall be trained in
this grade for teaching in secondary institutions.
A compulsory course of Islamics
shall be combined with courses of study in both grades.
(16) The third stage of education should comprise
of Research in the various subjects comprehended by the faculties mentioned
above.
There should be separate academies
corresponding to the different faculties.
The scholars employed for guiding
the work in the academies should be concerned only with the work of research
and should have no teaching duties.
N.B.---
Research in the Medical subjects may be carried on with a view to evolve a
system which may comprehend in itself the virtues of the different systems of
Cure.
(17) Institutions for Infant and
Primary education should be named Mekteb; for secondary education, Madressah;
those connected with the stage of Special Study, Kulliah; those related
to the third stage, Dar-ut-Tahqiq. An institution which comprehends
education in all its stages should be known as Jamiah.
(18) Students completing the stage
of secondary education should be awarded the Certificate of Alim, in the
case of men, and of Alimah, in the case of women; those completing the
first sub-stage of Special Study, the Degree of Fazil or Fazilah;
those completing the second sub-stage of Special Study, the Degree of Kamil
or Kamilah; those completing the third stage, the Degree of Allahamah.
(19) Effort should be made to
attract Muslim youths more towards the study of Science, especially Applied
Science, and, in the domain of Arts, towards such serious subjects as
Philosophy, Politics, Economics, etc.
(20) (a) The
value of those who take the degree of Islamics should be the same for entering
Government jobs as of those who hold equivalent degrees in other subjects.
(b) In
a free Muslim state, those who qualify in Islamics should have a preferential
right over others for administrative and judicial posts.
(c) Effort
should be made by the nation o eliminate the aimless type of theologian, and,
in a free Muslim state particularly. . . . theologians should be absorbed into
a powerful missionary movement for the consolidation and propagation of Islam
(which is one of the essential conditions of its survival).
(d) Besides
the one scheme of Islamic studies presented in the foregoing, an alternative
scheme may also be given. This other scheme is as follows:--
Subjects of study may be divided
into three groups:--
Group 1:
(i)
Quran and allied subjects.
(ii)
Hadith and allied subjects.
(iii)
Fiqh.
(iv)
History of Fiqh.
(v)
Islamic Jurisprudence.
(vi)
Arabic Language and Literature.
(vii)
Islamic History.
(viii)
History of Muslim Thought.
(ix)
Languages: Persian, English, German, French.
Group 2:
(i)
Comparative Religion.
(ii)
Philosophy of Religion.
(iii)
An outline of non-Muslim Philosophical Thought.
Group 3:
(i)
Islamic Political Theory and Practice.
(ii)
Islamic Economics.
(iii)
Non-Muslim Jurisprudence.
Those who may intend to take up the role of Ulema
and missionaries shall combine Group 1 with Group 2.
Those who may intend, in an autonomous Muslim
state, to enter judicial and administrative departments or to practice as
lawyers, shall combine Group 1 with Group 3.
LAST REMARKS
Here end my Twenty Points. And now I may refer
to two further points which require elucidation:---
(1)
The present political conditions in India shall perhaps
make it necessary to maintain a formal uniformity in Indian education,
even when we shall have succeeded in achieving Educational Autonomy. In that
respect my plan might have to be slightly altered without injuring its basic
Islamic character.
(2)
A superficial glance at the courses of study
planned above might perhaps mislead some to feel that I have not succeeded in
transforming my educational ideology into a practical form, for they will read
there the very same names of ‘secular’ subjects to which they have been so far
accustomed, and they might accuse me of adopting the very same patch-work
method against which I have revolted. But if they may succeed in visualizing
the intellectual background, the form of the text-books of ‘secular’ subjects
as well as of ‘Islamics’, the type of teachers who are to be created, and the
whole new atmosphere of Muslim educational institutions, - if they can
visualize all this in the light of my educational ideology, they will in all
probability agree with me that this or some other more perfect but similar
educational system should be adopted for meeting the demands of Islam in the
present age.
5
OUR FIRST STEP INTO THE FUTURE
THREE SCHEMES
FOR THE ADVANCEMENT OF ISLAMIC RESEARCH
Preliminary Remarks
Before stating the practical schemes for the
execution of the work of Research, some preliminary remarks are necessary:---
(1)
The difficulties to be surmounted in the course of our
intellectual struggle are many and varied and a successful accomplishment of
the task requires that a most well-coordinated and extensively-organised effort
be undertaken by Muslim scholars from all over the Islamic world. But this in
itself should neither deter us, Muslims of India, from taking the task in hand
nor lead us to remain in a passive state of expectation until the required
world-wide awakening takes place. The practical method of bringing about the
awakening itself is to start the work in right earnest – here and now.
(2)
It is with this view that I have proposed the
establishment of a model Research Academy. Such an institution will form our first
right step into the future; for, by establishing such an Academy, we shall
not only succeed in creating a new and rue system of Muslim national education,
but we shall also simultaneously be able to stir the virtually stagnant waters
of Muslim intellectual life and to impart to them a right direction and,
further, to lay the foundations of an Islamic Intellectual Renaissance. The
Academy shall therefore be not only a place where scholars shall carry on
research, but also a coordinating centre for all those individual streams of Islamic
intellectual activity which may exist outside the organization of the Academy,
thus helping to create a uniform and vigorous Intellectual Movement.
(3)
I have said elsewhere that the venue of the Academy
should be either Aligarh or Hyderabad – the two seats of Muslim education in
India which combine instruction in theology with courses of modern studies. But
the schemes which I am going to state herein below have been formulated with
particular reference to Aligarh, --- though this obviously does not mean that
they, especially the first, cannot be instituted at Hyderabad. As regards
Aligarh, however, I have taken into consideration both the premier Muslim
institutions namely, the Muslim University and the All-India Muslim Educational
Conference.
(4)
Of the three schemes which I am presenting, the first
alone is comprehensive. The second is an alternative scheme on the same
lines but having reference to a part of the great work before us, and meant to
be adopted in case it is not financially possible to institute the first scheme
immediately. The third scheme has been raised on the foundations of the popular
Muslim educational ideology of the present day, and the scope of the work
proposed is such that the scheme can be put into effect today itself.
With these preliminary
remarks, I may now state the schemes.
Scheme No. 1
ESTABLISHMENT OF A CENTRAL ISLAMIC
RESEARCH ACADEMY BY THE ALL-INDIA
MUSLIM LEAGUE
An Islamic Research Academy called Dar-ut-Tahqiq-il-Islami
may be established by the All-India Muslim League at Aligarh within the
organization of the Muslim University.
Keeping
in view the work of the Academy outlined in the previous chapter, and taking
(naturally) the first stage of work alone into consideration for the present, the Academy may be divided structurally
into two sections:--
(1)
Arts Section; (2) Science
Section.
Arts Section:
The
Arts section may be divided into the following departments:---
(1)
Philosophy of Religion, Metaphysics, Mysticism;
(2)
Moral and Political Philosophy;
(3)
Economics;
(4)
Law and Jurisprudence;
(5)
Comparative Religion;
(6)
Islamic History.
N.B.---Sectionally
viewed:--
Work in the first four departments
shall be two-fold:
(a)
Statement and evaluation of Islam in the light of modern
thought;
(b)
Compilation and evaluation of Muslim contribution to the
subjects falling within these four departments.
Work in department no. 5 shall be:---
(a)
To develop the subject of Comparative Religion from the
Islamic standpoint, and,
(b)
To evaluate Islam in the background of the religious
thought of the world.
Work in department no 6 shall be:---
(a)
To write a complete cultural and political history of
Islam, and,
(b)
Its evaluation in the light of the Philosophy of History.
Science Section:
The
Science section may be divided into the following departments:---
(1)
Astronomy and Mathematics;
(2)
Physics;
(3)
Chemistry;
(4)
Botany and Agriculture;
(5)
Zoology;
(6)
Medicine;
(7)
Geography and Geology;
(8)
Engineering.
N.B.---Sectionally
viewed:---
Work in this section shall be:---
(a)
To collect, compile and expound the contribution of
Muslim scientists to the different departments of Science;
(b)
To evaluate those contributions with reference to
pre-Islamic as well as modern scientific thought;
(c)
To perform practical work, when and where necessary to
demonstrate and explain properly the work of Muslim scientists and to carry on
research with a view to discovering eh possibilities which were inherent in the
Muslim scientific thought;
(d)
To lay the foundations of the evolution of a Muslim point
of view, wherever and in so far as necessary.
Scholars:
The
Arts section should have, in the beginning, at least:---
(1)
Eight permanent scholars, one for each of the
first five departments and three for the sixth department, who should be at the
same time Fellows of the Muslim University;
(2)
Six non-permanent scholars, one for each
department, who should work as students for the degree of Doctorate in the
different departments of the University.
The Science section should have, in the
beginning, at least eight permanent scholars, one for each department, who
should be at the same time Fellows of the Muslim University, attached to the
respective departments according to the classification of the subjects given in
the foregoing.
N.B.---Besides the two categories of scholars
just mentioned, namely, permanent and non-permanent, there is a third category,
viz., those who cannot join the Academy permanently, but who can be co-opted as
members of the Academy. The cooperation of such scholars will be fact
indispensable. It will be necessary, for instance, to get guidance from the
eminent: Muslim theologians of India other, countries, and from the Muslim scientists
of the present day.
Qualifications:
The
qualifications required for the permanent scholars of the Arts section are:---
(1)
They should have a pure Islamic outlook;
(2)
They should possess theological knowledge according to
the standard of our theological education in India;
(3)
They should possess working knowledge of Arabic, Persian,
English, German and French languages, so that they may have access to the whole
field of Islamics and modern literature having a bearing on their subjects;
(4)
They should hold M.A. degree in the subject pertaining to
the department which they may intend to join;
(5)
They should have done some research in their subject and
should preferably hold a degree of Doctorate.
The qualifications required for the
non-permanent scholars of the Arts section are:---
(1)
Their mental make-up and ideals should be Islamics;
(2)
They should possess a working knowledge of Isalmic
theology and the Arabic language;
(3)
They should hold M.A. degree in the subject in which they
want to work.
The qualifications required for the scholars
of the Science section are:---
(1)
They should be endowed with a love and respect for Islam
and Islamic civilisation;
(2)
They should possess a good working knowledge of Arabic;
(3)
They should posses
the requisite modern degree in the subject in which they want to work, as, for
instance, in Mathematics, a first or second class M.A. degree.
The Financial Problem:
Perhaps
the hardest nut to crack is the financial implications of the scheme, for the
boat of many a noble enterprise of the Musulmans has capsized on this seemingly
all-too-formidable rock.
The
establishment of the scheme presents two main items of expenditure:
(1)
Salaries and scholarships of the scholars;
(2)
A library large enough to meet the requirements of the
Academy.
There are two
more items which I am not including here in view of the economy which I wish to
introduce into the scheme, namely, (1) a Journal which should be the official
organ of the Academy, and (2) a publishing concern for organizing the
publication of the work of the Academy on a commercial basis.
There
can be no denying the fact that, besides the function of accomplishing the
groundwork for a national system of Muslim education, the Academy should also
simultaneously serve the ends of feeding the stream of faith by re-discovering
the intellectual basis of Islam for the bewildered Musulman of today and of
bringing about an Islamic Intellectual Awakening in the world outside India by
blowing with its life-giving breath the smouldering intellectual embers of the Ummat
into a rosy flame. The realization of such a comprehensive ideal would require
the establishment of journals in three languages, viz., Urdu, Arabic, English,
and of a full-fledged publishing concern. But I am not emphasizing these two
items here, mostly because journals and publishing concerns of the required
type already exist and their cooperation can be easily obtained.
For
the present, therefore, we have to consider only the two items selected. Among
these two, item no: 2 can be met by utilizing the library of the University and
its funds. Thus there remains only one item which will tax our financial
resources, i.e., item no. 1.
Taking
all aspects of the problem into consideration, it seems advisable that:
(1)
The permanent scholars should be paid a Fellowship of Rs.
500 per mensem;
(2)
The non-permanent scholars should be paid a scholarship
of Rs. 125 mensem. This, I understand, is in conformity with the status of
Islamic Research Scholars as envisaged in the Calcutta University scheme of
Islamic Studies.
Thus the total
of the salaries of sixteen permanent scholars and the scholarships of six
non-permanent scholars would come to Rs. 8,750 per month, or, Rs. 1,05,000 per
annum.
This
would require an endowment of Rs. 50 lacs for establishing the Academy on a
permanent basis.
If
it is found impossible to manage for this sum, the number of scholars may be
doubled and a Ten-year Plan may be adopted, for which a sum of Rs. 20 lacs
would be required.
An
alternative scale of salaries and scholarships can be:---Rs. 300 per month for
the permanent scholars and Rs. 75 per month for the non-permanent scholars,
though it would probably be difficult to get right type of scholars in that
case. With this scale, a permanent endowment of Rs. 25,20,000 or, in case of a
Ten-year Plan, a total investment of Rs. 12,60,000 would be required.
Anyway,
whatever be the exact sum required for a successful establishment of the
Academy, the truth remains unaltered that no amount of money is greater that
the importance and the urgency of the task, and the success will depend mostly
on the fact whether the influential Musulmans of India are prepared o take a
practical interest in the future of Islam and to give a right lead to the
nation.
There
can be several ways of solving the financial difficulty. For instance:---
In
the first place, the Muslim rulers and commercial magnates of India are in
every respect in a position to create an endowment which can meet all demands
of the Academy at the start as also during the further stages of its growth.
Secondly,
the cooperation of Muslim charitable endowments and educational trusts, like
the Dawoodbhoy Fazalbhoy Trust, can be sought for sharing the burden of the
finances of the Academy.
I
wish to point out here that, in Europe and America, the Christians have created
numerous big endowments, not only for carrying on constructive intellectual
work for their faith, but also for work of destructive character, especially
against Islam. An instance of this is the Princeton Theological Seminary of the
United States, one scholar of which, viz., D. B. Macdonald, has published
several books on Islam,---books full of vituperative eloquence and errors, but
nevertheless so indispensable that the Muslim University of Aligarh was
compelled to include one of them in its courses of study. Would it not then be
a matter of national shame if the financial problem proves the Gordian knot at
this critical juncture in the history of Muslim India?
Scheme No. 2
ESTABLISHMENT OF FOUR ISLAMIC RESEARCH
FELLOWSHIPS BY THE MUSLIM UNIVERSITY
As I remarked before, the above scheme alone
is comprehensive. In case, however, it remains impossible, for one reason or
the other, to put that scheme into practice immediately, an easier path is open
for the leaders of Muslim education for moving towards the ideal.
The
Aligarh Muslim University may itself start the work even under the
present limitations imposed by her financial resources and institute, for the
time-being, under a well-coordinated scheme, four fellowships for Islamic
Research relating to the following four heads:---
(1)
Philosophy of Religion;
(2)
Moral and Political Philosophy;
(3)
Economics;
(4)
Islamic History and Political Constitution.
As regards the financial implications, the
scheme shall involve a monthly expenditure of Rs. 1,2000, in case the Fellows
are paid a monthly salary of Rs. 300 each.
The authorities of the University, imbued as
they are with a love for and responsibility towards Islam, can in all
probability find out some way for meeting this crying need of Muslim India. To
propose any reform in certain items of income and expenditure would be a too
delicate ground for me to tread. I can however say with absolute confidence
that any genuine move by the Muslim University for this service of Islam will
meet with the heartiest response from the nation. The University has already
rendered a signal service to Muslim learning by starting special courses in
Muslim Philosophy and Islamic History, and it is high item now take the next
step.
Recently, our beloved Chancellor, His Exalted
Highness the Nizam of Hyderabad, to whose royal munificence and love of Islam
Muslim learning is indebted more than to the help of any other individual in
India, announced his noble intention of building a mosque in the Muslim
University in remembrance of his revered mother. That noble idea may be
transformed into a still nobler – because more urgent – idea of Islamic
Research.
The Muslim University already possesses a
full-fledged department of Theology. What a great service to Islam can be
rendered if only its resources are fully moblilised for the advancement of
Islamic Research and if only the consciousness is created that the advancing
avalanche of Western materialism and irreligion is Himalayan in its magnitude.
Scheme No. 3
THE DUTY OF THE ALL-INDIA
MUSLIM EDUCATIONAL CONFERENCE
Besides the above two direct lines of
approach, there is another path open,---a path on which probably all can travel
without much uneasiness and hardship and lamentation. Let us, therefore, try to
travel by that path of least resistance and catch hold of the straws floating
on the ocean of Muslim national life, in the mean while struggling with all our
might to achieve our comprehensive and true ideal, in which alone lies our
chance of survival.
Of late the conscience of Muslim India has
been radiating thought-currents for the revival of what has been termed
‘Islamic History and Culture’. The Aligarh Muslim University has inaugurated
new special courses in Muslim Philosophy and Islamic History for the B.A. and
M.A. classes. The Calcutta University has passed a scheme for the establishment
of a department of Islamic studies. The Kemal Yar Jung Committee has made
strong recommendations for the inclusion of Islamic subjects in the courses of
study current in the Indian universities and colleges and for the establishment
of a Central Islamic Research Organisation under the auspices of the All-India
Muslim Educational Conference. And lastly, the All-India Muslim Educational
Conference passed, though it later overthrew, Dr. Afzal Husain Qadri’s
resolution which aimed at revising the constitution of that premier Muslim
educational organization to suit the new cultural aspirations of Muslim India.
The future success of such moves, however,
depends on the tenacity with which they are maintained and the foresight and
practical commonsense and Islamic outlook of those who are entrusted with the
task of transforming the vague beginnings into a well-shaped reality.
It will be well to consider here, in
connection with this transformation, a concrete aspect of these moves. It has
been proposed to introduce the study of Islamic Culture – conceived mostly in
two parts: Philosophy and History – into the educational institutions of India.
Now, such a proposal, however tangible it might be in itself, cannot be put
into practice without the existence of suitable text-books, which,
unfortunately, are quite non-existent. And not only are they non-existent; even
a definite and practical move to get them prepared does not yet exist.
This complete absence of text-books has indeed
a most pathetic aspect. To take up Muslim Philosophy, for instance: The
Aligarh Muslim University – the premier modern Muslim institution in Asia –
made a special provision for the teaching of ‘General Muslim Philosophy’ in the
M.A. class nearly fifteen years ago, and scores of students have studied this
subject since then. But upto the present day we do not possess a single
text-book on the subject, and work has been carried on by patch-work
arrangement, and that too based, not on Muslim scholarship, but on books
written by the Rev. O Leary, the Rev. D. B. Macdonald, Dr. T. J. De. Boer and
Professor Nicholson all of whom are men whose Christian bias and unscientific
malevolence is writ large on every page of their books.
The plight of Islamic History is not a
whit less painful. In the first place, our scholars do not yet seem to have
realized the scope of the subject. For them the history of Islam is synonymous
with the political history of the early Caliphate, the Umayyed dynasty,
the Abbasid dynasty, the Ottoman dynasty, Moorish Spain and Moghul India. Ever
the greatest among us hardly have any but a vague conception – not to say, knowledge
– of the history of Muslims in Soviet Russia or China, or Siam, or Malaya, or
the East Indies, or the Philippines, or the vast continent of Africa – though
this enumeration of regions too is not exhaustive. Then we seem totally to
overlook the fact that the history of a Movement – and Islam is essentially a
‘movement’ – or even of a nation cannot be confined merely to its political
aspect.
This fundamental defect in our vision is
wedded to an intellectual stagnation of the worst type. Ever since the late
Syed Amir Ali wrote his ‘Short History of the Saracens’, we, the
English-educated Muslim intellectuals, have felt satisfied in regarding it the
final product of Muslim genius, incapable of any further improvement. But as it
cannot really suffice, we have been forced to fall back upon such ‘friends’ of
Islam as Muir and Wellhausen and adopt the same patchwork arrangement as in the
case of Muslim Philosophy cited above.
These very brief references to Muslim
Philosophy and History have been made here only by way of illustration. A
thorough-going examination of the different sections of Muslim learning will
reveal an even more miserable state of affairs.
It is, therefore, in the fitness of things to
emphasise, and emphasise with all force at my command, that our first and
foremost and immediate duty should be to get the proper text-books prepared.
Unless this basic work is accomplished, it would be sheer rashness to think of
establishing the departments of Islamic Studies in any educational institution
of India.
It is high time that we learn to evaluate our
problems in practical terms, and I, for my part, wish to offer a concrete
proposal which can be put into effect immediately.
I propose that the All-India Muslim
Educational Conference, on which such a duty devolves more than on any other
institution, should create, as an immediate measure of starting the work of
Islamic Research, at least two Research Fellowships, of Rs. 300 each, one
for the comprehensive domain of Muslim Philosophy and the other for the vast
field of Islamic History.
I further propose that as the Muslim
University has already started special courses of Muslim Philosophy and Islamic
History in the M.A. classes, the fellowships should be allocated to this
university, which should, in its turn, appoint the fellows and provide the
facilities necessary for Islamic Research, as, for instance, the creation of a
full-fledged Islamic section in the Lyton Library.
The fellows should be attached to the
respective departments of Philosophy and History and should work in
collaboration with Muslim scholars inside and outside the University.
The scholars selected for the task should be
those who possess the requisite academic qualifications – both ‘theological’
and ‘secular’ – and also a genuine Islamic outlook and a love and respect for Islamic
culture. Their function should be, in the first place, to compile the required
text-books, and, secondly, to lay the foundations of high-class Islamic
Research.
This, in short, is my humble proposal, and I
strongly feel that neither the Muslim Educational Conference nor the Muslim
University should have any hitch in adopting it immediately. The
Conference can perhaps easily manage to earmark a sum for such a fundamental
nation-building work. And as for the University, it will add one more feather
to her crown of glory. Need it be emphasized that such an enterprise is
inherent in their very constitutions?
The fact may again be stressed that the ideal
of Islamic Intellectual Revival has manifold implications and its practical
fulfillment might require the labours of many generations of Muslim scholars.
In spite of that, however, a humble beginning can be made, or, rather, ought
to be made, with whatever resources we can command just now. We can start in
this tangible and practical way and can in the meanwhile train scholars who
will work for the systematization of Islamic Economics, Islamic Political
Science and Islamic Sociology – until the subject of Islamic Culture becomes an
empire by itself. And the seed we will thus sow will continue to grow till at
last the luxuriant foliage of Islamic Learning overshadows the whole system of
our national education.
6
LAST REMARKS
SOME OBJECTIONS ANSWERED
I am afraid my ideology might give rise to
some objections in certain minds which I may anticipate and remove here
itself:---
(1)
I might be regarded as emphasizing the intellectual
factor in our national life to the neglect of other factors. Not the least. I
do not believe in segregating different problems into watertight compartments.
If life is an organic unity and if Islam comprehends life in its totality, any
such segregation would be logically impossible.
(2)
I have emphasized Research as an essential work to be
completed before planning and instituting a national system of education. This
might be regarded by some as a matter of mere academic interest and therefore
outside the domain of activity of a political organization like the All-India
Muslim League. Such an idea would, however, be erroneous, for not only a work
of that type is necessary for the creation of a Muslim intelligentsia which may
be capable of achieving, maintaining, and building up Pakistan, but the very
problem of working out the political and economic constitution of Pakistan on
sound Islamic lines is dependent on that.
(3)
Some of my readers, while conceding the necessity of
Research, might at the same time regard the undertaking of such a task an
impossibility on the ground that scholars of the required type do not exist.
To this my
reply is two-fold:---
(a)
The law of Demand and Supply obtains universally in the
world. Hence, once our nation launches its demand in right earnest, scholars of
the required type will soon be created;
(b)
Besides this, such, a misgiving is in fact without
foundation. There are many scholars in India who possess the requisite
enthusiasm for Islam and whose scholarship can be brought to the required standard
by a little training, but who are, out of sheer lack of opportunity, wasting
their lives in professional careers.
(4)
Some might suggest that certain individual efforts in the
field of Islamic Research, which exist in eh Muslim world of today, are by themselves
enough to achieve the desired results.
My reply
is:---To put absolute faith in such individual efforts would mean nothing less
than miscalculation of the magnitude of the task. The task is indeed so
gigantic that to exhaust all its aspects the labours of more than one
generation of scholars would be needed. Might my friends remember that ‘one
sparrow does not make a spring’.
(5)
Some might attribute vagueness to my scheme of research
as I have avoided giving a detailed chart of the problems which shall have to
be tackled by the scholars of the Academy and suggesting the possible lines on
which the solution of those problems should proceed.
But this is
precisely the work for which the establishment of the Academy is so necessary.
A FINAL APPEAL
I wish every Mususlman to remember one
heart-rending fact once for all:
The
Muslim world, including Muslim India, has already forfeited much of its
individuality and now stands in danger of losing its destiny.
I
further wish every Musulman to realize, and realize finally, that the impending
danger cannot be averted either by sticking to the old conservative
technique, or by means of heresy-hunts or coups de baton or theological
patchworks, or by building up national programmes on the shifting sands of
expediency.
Only
a scientific approach to our present peril a rational analysis of the shame and
misery that surrounds us, a re-search in the ever-fresh and fertile fields of
the Holy Quran and the Sunnah for finding out the possibilities of the revival
of Islam as a world-polity, can save us from our inevitable doom.
Indeed,
unless Islam wages a determined, final and all-out war against the
thought-forces of modern materialism and skepticism, and triumphs in establishing
its own world-order, Islam must suffer the fate which is overtaking all other
faiths; and if, knowing the infinite resources and strength of Islam in this
respect, we Muslims of the present day shirk our duty and thus deprive
ourselves and humanity of the blessings of Islam, we should be regarded as the
greatest criminals of all history.
Let
Iqbal’s immortal message of Faith ring across the world of Islam:--
یقیں، اللہ مستی، خود گزینی
یقیں، مثل خلیل، آتش نشینی
سن اے تہذیبِ حاضر کے گرفتار!
غلامی سے ھے بد تر بے یقینی
Let
the war-cry of every Musulman be:--
Away
from Aristotle and Plato. Away from Plotinus and his hosts. Away from Mill and
Marx. Away from the spiritual perversion of Nationalism. Away from the moral
devastation of Capitalism. Away from the atheistic implication of Communism.
Away from the effeminate mysticism of the Orient. Away from the hedonistic
materialism of the Occident.
Away
from all these, and many other un-Islamic and anti-Islamic sign-posts of human
history, and---
Back
to Allah, the Author of our existence, the Author of Islam, the Author of the
universe;
Back
to the Quranic stream of perennial life and light;
Back
to the world-leader Muhammad (may Allah’s choicest blessings be with him for
all time to come !).
بہ مصطفیٰ برساں خویش را کہ دیں ہمہ اوست
اگر بہ اُو نرسیدی تمام بو لہبی ست
(اقبال)
HAFIZ MUHAMMAD FAZL-UR-RAHMAN’S
ILLUMINATING MESSAGE TO CHRISTENDOM
ISLAM AND CHRISTIANITY IN
THE
MODERN WORLD
Cr. 8vo. Pp.
250.
The Author has taken the greatest care in the
selection of authorities, an overwhelming majority of whom are professed
Christians, including a large number of reputed Christian divines, thus
rendering his work authoritative and free from that tincture of bitterness
which usually mars polemical literature.
A fairer treatment of Christianity could not
have been possible, and the Author rightly appeals to the Christian world in
general and the reformed Churches in particular to study the comparative merits
of Islam and Christianity with an open mind.
SUPPLIED FREE TO CHRISTIANS IN INDIA
(on payment of postage: As. 8.)
By:
THE ALIGARH BOOKS-AND-NEWSPAPERS AGENCY,
6, Shibli Road, Muslim University,
ALIGHARH.
[1]
This statement should not be applied to those Islamic scholars who uphold and
maintain a dynamic orthodox outlook.
[2]
This may not mislead anyone to accuse me of tajaddud (modernism). I hold
a firm and abiding faith in orthodox Islam, and that not only on theological
but also on philosophical basis. To me heterodoxy is synonymous with
intellectual dishonesty and the very word ‘apologetics’ is self-condemnatory.
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