Reflections

Reflections

1987 2 February 26-30 Reflections (2003) A gathering of educated Muslim women was held in New Delhi on December 1, 1986, on the occasion of Miladun Nabi in Commemoration of the Prophet’s birthday. At this function, one of the participants underscored the plight of present – day Muslims, by saying: “Muslims are the worst nation in the world!” Joining in the discussions, I put forward the view that this could be explained by their having forsaken their primary responsibility. Being the followers of the Last Prophet, the most important of their duties was surely to convey the true religion of God to the people around them. But, in actual fact, they have engaged in every other activity save this one. My making of this point caused the ladies to exclaim in unison and with great vehemence: “Let the Muslims first reform themselves and then only will they be fit to invite others to Islam!” This high – pitched admonition clearly expressed the feelings of the group that there were serious shortcomings in the members of their own community, but, to our way of thinking, their sense of priority was wrong, for it is surely sinful to postpone Dawah work (conveying the message of God to fill mankind) on the pretext that Muslim morals are first in need of reform. Dawah is one of those divine commandments which are absolute requirements. It is, therefore, indisputably unlawful to postpone it, irrespective of the reason. A fundamental aspect of Dawah, which must be understood once and for all is that it is in no sense a Muslim national activity: it is a means of carrying out the work of God Himself. Neither is the work of Dawah to be undertaken in order to improve the position of Muslims. It is to be done simply because this is the desire of the Almighty. From beginning to end, this is what is meant by Dawah.

We must never lose sight of the fact that God created the world according to a particular plan, whose most important element was that of trial. In the present world, man is born free, for God wishes to see which of us exercises his right of freedom to adhere to the truth, and which of us misuses his freedom by doing exactly the opposite. God will reward those who prove to be worshippers of the truth with eternal paradise in the life after death, while those who deviate from the Right Path will be consigned to the flames of eternal hellfire.

Now the question arises as to what is truth and what is untruth. And how is a man to learn the limits within which he is to use his freedom? What, on the other hand, is that headlong course, on which once launched, he will be held to be guilty of having deviated from the path of moral rectitude! The guidance offered by the Prophet gives us the answers to these questions. And the only authentic rendering of this guidance is to be found in the Quran. Prior to its existence, a number of prophets had already been sent by God to impart this guidance to man. But it had never been possible to preserve the books of revelation in their original form. God, therefore, was instrumental in having the last divine scriptures – the Quran – preserved in its entirety so that; till Doomsday, it would serve as an authentic yardstick by which to measure truth and untruth.

An invitation to the religion of God means conveying to people this religion, every word of which has been preserved in its pristine state. Muslims are the privileged inheritors of this genuine Book of God and must at all times convince others of its verity. In no case can they ever be discharged of this grave responsibility.

A judge is undoubtedly required to be just in his personal life, but, even if he is not this fact in no way authorizes him to pronounce unjust verdicts in his official capacity. Nor does it authorize him to withhold judgement. A judge he is, and judge he must. Similarly, Muslims are Muslim and as such, are normally obliged to engage in Dawah work. Their falling short of the highest standards of Islamic ethics in their personal lives is certainly no reason to decide that Dawah Work must be left until later, or not done at all. Just as it is a fact that they will be held to account for their moral deficiencies on the Day of Reckoning, it is equally true that they will be taken to task for their non – performance of Dawah.

It is noteworthy that in the Quran and Hadith, Muslims are asked to become true believers but nowhere in either of these Scriptures has it been laid down that in the first instance Muslims should first become fully practising believers and only then invite others to Islam. This theory is clearly alien to the Quran and Hadith, and its absence is quite sufficient to show how hollow is the concept of postponement.

Whether others submit to the truth or not depends entirely on their being convinced of it on a theoretical plane, and relates in no way to the moral calibre of its exponent. The best illustration of this point is to be found in the history of the prophets. We know from the Quran that all the prophets sent by God were, at least initially, rejected by their people. It is an unassailable truth that the lives of all the Prophets without exception were lived on the highest possible level of ethics. If personal good conduct were the sale determining factor in the acceptance or rejection of the message, then the people to whom the prophets addressed themselves should have immediately accepted their message.

The people of Iraq must all have believed in Abraham. And the majority of the people of ancient Palestine must have accepted the word of Jesus. But this did not happen with any prophet known to us. Even the Prophet of Islam, who was commonly known to Meccans as AI-Ameen (the honest, the trustworthy) elicited no great response and received no great acclaim from his hearers when he brought them the message of Islam. The fact is, that the acceptance or denial of truth has always had causes which were unrelated to the personal character of the Daayees1. In the life of the Prophet of Islam there are various instances of individuals coming from other tribes (e.g. Qais of the Daus tribe), hearing him recite some verses from the Quran and becoming immediately converted to Islam. The Prophet thereupon sent the new converts back to their tribes to call them also to Islam. If it were true that a would-be preacher should achieve the highest standards of Islamic conduct before he began the work of Dawah, the Prophet should have kept such converts with him for prolonged periods to ensure that they were perfect in every respect before sending them off as Dayees. The fact that he did not consider it necessary to do so is a clear indication that the theory of postponement is a fallacy.

1. One who calls mankind to Truth

Moses was clearly one of those Prophets who found himself in a situation which is similar to that of modern Muslims, in that when he was appointed God’s messenger, he had to deal with two kinds of people at the same time: On the one hand, the Children of Israel, who were the believers of that era, and, on the other hand, Pharaoh and his people. Yet the Prophet Moses was not commanded first of all to reform his own people and only after that attempt to convey the divine message to Pharaoh. He was commanded rather to perform both tasks simultaneously, and this is exactly what he proceeded to do.

Let us suppose that moral perfection were considered the first prerequisite for a Dawah worker. As a prior condition, this would be found be totally impracticable. For who is to say whether the preacher in question comes up to the highest standards of Islamic morals? If the decision were to be taken by the individuals concerned it is just possible that every Muslim would consider himself quite up to the mark. Few would be ready to admit to their own shortcomings. If the decision had to be taken by someone else, who would be fit to appoint an arbiter, even if such a person could be chosen and appointed. We should never be able to get away from the fact that besides God and the Prophet, there is no one who can claim to have an exhaustive knowledge of people’s actions and intentions. Neither the Dayee nor anyone else is in a position to make an absolutely correct evaluation of his moral fibre. This being, so, who is to-say yea or nay to his becoming a Dayee?

If such stringent curbs were placed on Dawah activity – that is, if all Muslims had to be one hundred percent reformed before others could be invited to Islam, Dawah work would come to a complete standstill. If this was not considered necessary in the days of the Prophet, how can it be claimed as a prior requirement nowadays? Consider that if all Muslims had managed to raise themselves to the most elevated plane of Islamic conduct during the Prophet’s lifetime, how could it have been possible for large numbers of them to lapse into apostasy after his death? – as actually leading to the breaking out of war between them and the first Caliph, Abu Bakr.

Throughout the first thousand years of Islamic history we find that converts to Islam became Dayees from the very moment of their acceptance. The society of that period never insisted that the message of Islam could not be propagated without first reforming all Muslims. So far, the best account of this aspect of Dawah is to be found in T.W. Arnold’s, The Preaching of Islam, a work written after a long period of detailed research.

Throughout the whole of Islamic history, it is only in modern times that we ever hear of such pretexts being found for Muslims to abandon or postpone the work of Dawah. The worst aspect of this situation is that other activities in which they engage, are frequently misinterpreted as Dawah efforts or, at least are labelled as such out of prejudice or ignorance. This is adding insult to injury. To call just any work Dawah work will lessen one’s chances of figuring well in the court God, for such actions are no less accountable for than positive crimes. Juggling with terms in no way lessens one’s clear-cut responsibilities.

The personal moral Improvement which is made into an excuse for not carrying out Dawah work is actually accomplished during the performance of a lofty goal. It is a psychological axiom that man’s nobility of character manifests itself only when he has a noble goal before him. The higher the goal, the better the character it moulds.

The eternal future of man rests on his adherence to God’s will and the latter is something which is to be found in its pristine form only in the Quran. This being so, those who bring the message of the Quran to the nations of the world have, in fact, the greatest of all possible goals. Taking up the task of Islamic Dawah means rising to the greatest mission of human history.

It is a matter of the greatest regret that Muslims have lost sight of this goal in modern times. This is the most cogent reason for their having lost their sublimity of character. The only way to bring them back to moral rectitude is to raise them once again to the status of preacher of the truth. They must have it re-inculcated in them that they are the preachers and other nations are their congregations. The day this happens, Muslims will regain all that they have lost in the modern world and even more.

(FARIDA KHANAM)