FROM MAULANA’S DESK

Patience for a human being or a human group is just like the heat applied to water. When water is heated up to hundred degrees centigrade, it starts boiling. The molecules of water change their state from liquid to gas, and scatter outward in the form of vapour. In this way, heat converts water into gas. Water taking the form of gas becomes so powerful that it can move mighty machines. In a similar way, when a group is continually faced with adverse circumstances, when its very identity is challenged, it reaches the point of explosion. Its latent capabilities are so aroused that it rises from the state of “water” and turns into “vapour”. History shows that whenever a group has faced persecution, its potential has been awakened. It has emerged in the form of an unconquerable force. Arnold Toynbee, a historian, has termed this process as Challenge-Response Mechanism. It is patience coupled with wise strategy that converts this ordinary group into an extraordinary group. o Maulana Wahiduddin Khan editor@thespiritofislam.org Follow Maulana at speakingtree.in (Times of India)