On 24th of November, 2008 a column appeared in the daily Jang in Urdu by Bushra Ijaz. The article can be accessed and read at http://www.jang.com.pk/jang/nov2008-daily/24-11-2008/col4.htm. I was deeply moved by the column in the sense that it was a blend of facts and opinions, mixed in a way to attract the 'Islam loving' reader and at the same time striking a blow to secularize him, without him even noticing it. This is not the first such article, rather most of our dailies are filled with such columns, which on their face value appear very Islamic but in reality question the very fact of Islam being a comprehensive way of life for all times and people. While more 'secular' writers contributing mainly in English dailies would use terms like 'moderation', 'enlightenment', 'modernity' and 'progress', those publishing in Urdu dailies misguide their readers by using words like 'ijtihad', 'tajdeed', 'maslehat' and 'zaroorat'. These advocates of moderation are driven by different motives. Needless to say, while some are sincere in their intentions and misled by their ignorance or misunderstandings about Islam, others hate Islam and deliberately present a mixture of facts and myths to malign it. As the knowledge of intentions is something between the individual and Allah (swt), none of the posts should be seen as an attempt to question the sincerity of the writer in question. Rather, it is an effort to delineate the twisted thinking employed by many today when it comes to Islam. It is an effort to debunk the fallacies and wrong assumptions on which such writers rest their arguments. It is an effort to make you think rationally again, which would mean knowing where and how to use your intellect and where to rely on divine injunctions, even if something appears utterly irrational to our limited mind.
Now coming to the column, it starts off with emotionalizing the reader about 'women rights' by pointing out some recent atrocities which were neither carried out in the name of Islam, nor were they a result of its teachings. On the contrary, they are a result of non-implementation of Islam at an individual, societal, governmental and global level. Still, the author jumps to call for an ijtihad, a need to reconsider Islamic laws on such atrocities, as if the ones which are already there were being implemented and not solving the problem or there were none in this matter! The interesting thing to be noticed is that while calling for an ijtihad the author doesn't bother to point out what is 'new' about this whole issue? We are not talking about praying on North pole where the Sun either doesn't set or doesn't dawn for as long as six months, nor are we talking about stem cell research for which the hukm of Islam needs to be deduced from the available Sharai' texts. No, we are talking about cases of rape, murder, domestic violence and torture inflicted upon women. Islam has not remained silent or ambiguous on these issues, such that it requires any adjustment or change. What does need to change, however, is the pathetic system of justice in Pakistan which has left enough loopholes for the mighty and the rich to escape prosecution. Such change is in line with what Islam has taught and what we already know of it.
In the next paragraph, the author brings Allama Iqbal's general statement about the need for ijtihad as an evidence. It is correctly pointed out that the Ottomans having closed the doors of ijtihad, decided not to adopt the printing press and other technological inventions in the Islamic state, thereby dealing a blow to it. What the author points out is a good example of how abandoning the correct application of ijtihad harmed Muslims; but what follows are suggestions of misapplying ijtihad. She hints that issues like Hudood, men marrying more than one wife, laws of women witnesses and right of divorce for women should be reconsidered in the name of ijtihad without bothering to point out what has changed in all these matters and how these issues have contributed to the downfall of Muslims from their glorious past. She further suggests that while the West produced the likes of Adam Smith and Karl Marx, Muslims are still studying the classical texts of 'Kitab al-Kharaj' and 'Kitab al-Amwaal'. Now this is the line which motivated me to write this blog. I have two objections on this statement. Firstly, how does the author fail to realize that both the names mentioned are of people who attempted to give a man-made economic system to the world, failing miserably and creating misery for the majority. Karl Marx, with his socialist economic system already failed and not even the Chinese and the Russians speak of going back to such a flawed system anymore. Adam Smith is the founding father of the capitalist economic system which has become one of the biggest disasters and a source of brutal economic exploitation and greed. Today, when even non-Muslims are criticizing the capitalist economy in the wake of the recent financial crisis, how could a Muslim take pride in its founder? Or is the author suggesting that a system which is based on interest, speculation, privatization of public assets and general taxation - all of which are forbidden in Islam - is superior to what Islam has given us?
Now coming to the column, it starts off with emotionalizing the reader about 'women rights' by pointing out some recent atrocities which were neither carried out in the name of Islam, nor were they a result of its teachings. On the contrary, they are a result of non-implementation of Islam at an individual, societal, governmental and global level. Still, the author jumps to call for an ijtihad, a need to reconsider Islamic laws on such atrocities, as if the ones which are already there were being implemented and not solving the problem or there were none in this matter! The interesting thing to be noticed is that while calling for an ijtihad the author doesn't bother to point out what is 'new' about this whole issue? We are not talking about praying on North pole where the Sun either doesn't set or doesn't dawn for as long as six months, nor are we talking about stem cell research for which the hukm of Islam needs to be deduced from the available Sharai' texts. No, we are talking about cases of rape, murder, domestic violence and torture inflicted upon women. Islam has not remained silent or ambiguous on these issues, such that it requires any adjustment or change. What does need to change, however, is the pathetic system of justice in Pakistan which has left enough loopholes for the mighty and the rich to escape prosecution. Such change is in line with what Islam has taught and what we already know of it.
In the next paragraph, the author brings Allama Iqbal's general statement about the need for ijtihad as an evidence. It is correctly pointed out that the Ottomans having closed the doors of ijtihad, decided not to adopt the printing press and other technological inventions in the Islamic state, thereby dealing a blow to it. What the author points out is a good example of how abandoning the correct application of ijtihad harmed Muslims; but what follows are suggestions of misapplying ijtihad. She hints that issues like Hudood, men marrying more than one wife, laws of women witnesses and right of divorce for women should be reconsidered in the name of ijtihad without bothering to point out what has changed in all these matters and how these issues have contributed to the downfall of Muslims from their glorious past. She further suggests that while the West produced the likes of Adam Smith and Karl Marx, Muslims are still studying the classical texts of 'Kitab al-Kharaj' and 'Kitab al-Amwaal'. Now this is the line which motivated me to write this blog. I have two objections on this statement. Firstly, how does the author fail to realize that both the names mentioned are of people who attempted to give a man-made economic system to the world, failing miserably and creating misery for the majority. Karl Marx, with his socialist economic system already failed and not even the Chinese and the Russians speak of going back to such a flawed system anymore. Adam Smith is the founding father of the capitalist economic system which has become one of the biggest disasters and a source of brutal economic exploitation and greed. Today, when even non-Muslims are criticizing the capitalist economy in the wake of the recent financial crisis, how could a Muslim take pride in its founder? Or is the author suggesting that a system which is based on interest, speculation, privatization of public assets and general taxation - all of which are forbidden in Islam - is superior to what Islam has given us?
My second objection pertains to the mention of the two classical texts. Is it so difficult to see the difference between 'studying' something and 'implementing' it? Are these books, which can be seen as the pillars of the Islamic economic system, implemented anywhere in the Muslim world? If not, why does the author then blame the ills of Muslims on the books and in turn on Islam? Is it just because they are being studied though neither understood nor implemented? In fact it is the non-implementation of these and many other books; or in other words the non-implementation of Islam which is the root-cause of all our problems. If we sincerely want to turn the tide, we have to go back to our roots, which are the Quran and Sunnah, and implement them in their totality.
The author ends by asking why is it that unmarried girls (without an accompanying mahram) go abroad for seeking Western education and yet they and others are not allowed to do Hajj in absence of a male blood relative. It is sad to see that by pointing out one wrong deed, she wants to justify another, instead of rectifying it! Isn't this as banal and irrational as saying, 'because you missed your Dzuhr prayer, you should also not pray Asr or arguing that 'as one group of Muslims is not fasting, the other group doesn't need to pray anymore'? I am not discussing the sharai' hukm on either hajj or travel abroad here, what I want to point out is the un-Islamic way in which the author justifies the need to reconsider the hukm of women requiring a male relative while travelling.
I would like to conclude by saying that the purpose of ijtihad is definitively not to adjust and adapt Allah’s deen to the societal norms and practices of our times. On contrary, it is the exertive and exhaustive derivation of Allah’s hukm on a specific matter which is either new as a result of technological advancement or there exist contradictory evidences about it and scholars attempt to reconcile them to seek the truth. Therefore, it can be said with certainty that Islam, unlike computers, doesn’t need to be made Y2K compliant where programmers were so myopic in the 70s and 80s that they simply didn’t provide for the possibility of their software running beyond 31st December 1999!
Inshallah in the upcoming posts I will write on ijtihad; what it really is, how it is applied and what role its abandoning played in the downfall of Muslims. I will also write on the issue of 'What should we take from the West and what not' which has confused Muslims for centuries now. Until and unless Muslims start appreciating the difference between 'maddaniyya', objects which are unrelated to any specific belief (like car, computer, printing press) and 'hadarah' which are mainly concepts and also objects which emanate from a specific belief (like democracy, trinity, wearing of the cross), we are doomed to repeat our past mistakes.
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