ME AND MAULANA: A PERSONAL RECOLLECTION OF WAHIDUDDIN KHAN - John M. Butt

often anti-theistic dictators (Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot), the Islamist violence was carried out under religious slogans and the perpetrators explicitly stated their aims in religious terms. Their ideas and goals were fairly simple; Islam is not simply a faith like others, it is a whole sociopolitical system that should replace other systems. To be a proper Muslim requires faith not only in the main pillars of Islam, but also in its political message. But what was “New” about this interpretation? Is it not true that Islam is political? That it is, much like Judaism, and unlike Christianity, a religion of “Laws”? After all, there has never been the idea of a secular Law in Classical Islamic theology. So, what was so radically new in this movement? This question was perhaps addressed by many, but no one answered it (In my humble opinion) as coherently as a scholar from the Indian city of Azamgarh. His name was Maulana Wahiduddin Khan. Born in 1925, he was initially inspired by the works of Maulana Mawdudi and joined his Islamic political party (Jamaat-e-Islami). It is often stated sarcastically (and mostly by the political opponents of Jamaat-e-Islami) that whoever joins this party, never leaves. Or if they do leave, the party never leaves them (“Insan Jamaat-e -Islami sy nikal sakta hai, liken Insaan sy Jamaat-eIslami nahi”). Insinuating as it may sound, but there is some truth in it. Political Islam, much like secular totalitarian ideas like Marxism, does possess an aura which is hard to let go if you have been gravitated to it once. It is often noticed by many that people who do abandon their Marxist leanings still persist in seeing the world from a Marxist lens.