Our Social and Political Responsibilities while Awaiting Imam al-Mahdi (as) – ( Part 2 )

I have been at Muslim forums where this has been asserted from the podium — even though no-one in the room had even mentioned, let alone proposed — that striving for Shari’ah law should be an immediate perspective in Australia . The lecturer was simply determined to lay his so-called ‘moderate’ credentials on the table. In the process, he denounced central aspects of Islam. By denying Allah (swt)’s Divine framework for human society, and importing foreign concepts, the ‘moderate’ Muslims are then tempted to work alongside non-Muslims who claim to be ‘democratic’, on the basis that they have common agendas and principles.
This also dilutes the Muslims’ ability to put Islam first in their thoughts and actions. Muslims who work in the Muslim political arena, for instance, too often know little of Islamic teachings and scholarship, and are too deeply immersed in Western political thought. They are frequently quite unaware that the Western political terms they bandy around are inevitably laden with Western meanings, implications and other baggage that obstruct attempts to think clearly in Islamic terms.

I first remind myself that Allah (swt) commands and warns us:
[3:28] Let not the believers take the unbelievers for advisers [awliya’a] rather than believers; and whoever does this, he shall have nothing of (the guardianship of) Allah, but you should guard yourself against them, guarding carefully; and Allah makes you cautious of (retribution from) Himself; and to Allah is the eventual coming.

Then again, later, in the same Surah:
[3:118] O you who believe! Do not take for intimate friends from among others than your own people; they will not fail to corrupt you; they love what distresses you; vehement hatred has already appeared from out of their mouths, and what their breasts conceal is greater still; indeed, We have made the communication clear to you, if you will understand.
And the command of Allah (swt) is indeed crystal-clear. Yet still we frequently prefer the lure of the kafirs’ so-called ‘modernity’, to the straight path of Allah (swt). We are beguiled by the central lie of Western — i.e., man-made — ‘modernity’, that it is inherently ‘superior’ to any Eastern civilisation.
This lie has been around for literally hundreds of years. The West has long assumed that its technological and scientific progress — not mention its secularism and democracy— mark it as ‘superior’ to the poor benighted and backward East. We in the West are brought up to believe that the rest of the world absolutely must learn how to imitate us in these respects (technological and scientific progress, secularism and democracy).
The East is branded as ‘underdeveloped’, if not ‘backward’. Citizens in the United States and Australia are both convinced that they live in the ‘best country in the world’. We are still told that it is the secular West’ mission to bring ‘modernity’ to the backward East. And that to even question this is to supposedly ‘rebel … against the very law of nature itself’ (Maryam Jameelah, Is Western Civilization Universal?, 1966 edition, 4-5).

It follows from this analysis that
Along with all the long-established religions, Islam, its civilization and its institutions, are condemned and rejected on the pretext that any order based on Divine law revealed fourteen hundred years ago, could not possibly be valid and relevant to modern life (Ibid).
In opposition to traditional society, the West has erected the god of ‘unrestricted accelerating change’ (Is Western Civilization Universal?, 1966 edition, 8). Yet, as Shariati argues, Western ‘civilisation’ is really a systematic process called ‘modernisation’. Like Jameelah, he does not oppose technological advances. But he is very concerned about the social and cultural consequences of the West’s so-called ‘civilising’ mission. He questions precisely what it is that the West wants so urgently to ‘modernise’. He concludes that the West’s goal is ‘modernisation’ in consumption.

He comments:
And while the non-European is happy with the idea that he has been modernized, the European capitalist and bourgeois laugh at their success in converting him into a consumer of their surplus production.

Shariati believes that what has happened is that the West has succeeded to a very large extent in depriving the individuals in the East of their very personality. They would deprive him of his personality… He must be forced to believe himself related to a humbler civilization, a humbler social order, and accept that European civilization, Western civilization and the Western race are superior… The poor man does not realise that he is being modernized instead of being civilized…

I stated earlier that Muslims need to be careful when they bandy Western political terms and concepts laden with Western meanings and implications that obstruct attempts to think clearly in Islamic terms. ‘Democracy’ is perhaps the Western term that most needs to be avoided, if Western — i.e., man-made — ideological baggage is to be successfully excluded from Islamic political thought. The confusion being caused by the importing of ‘democracy’ into Muslim political discourse, and the damage this trend is doing to Muslim political thought and the Islamic movement, is immense and is likely to prove a great a problem in the future.
For it is Islam — pure and unadulterated Islam, with its system of Divine values — alone that stands for justice and an end to all oppression. By diluting these values in the name of being ‘modern’, the so-called ‘moderate’ Muslims undermine their ability to defend themselves from the attacks of the enemies of Allah (swt).

This is why the sworn enemies of Islam such as Cardinal Pell focus on such matters. Cardinal Pell writes about the so-called ‘totalitarian nature of Islamist ideology, and the brutality and rigidity of Islamist rule’. Yet the Holy Qur’an includes and entire chapter called ‘As-Shurah’, or ‘Consultation’.

Here and elsewhere in the Holy Qur’an, [3:159] Allah (swt) recognises that humans possess strong moral virtues, including the character to accept each others’ views and counsel. But He (swt) also recognises that weakness is inherent humans — our tendency to give in to our desires. Allah (swt) therefore provides us with Divine values:

[2:177] It is not righteousness that you turn your faces towards the East and the West, but righteousness is this that one should believe in Allah and the last day and the angels and the Book and he prophets, and give away wealth out of love for Him to the near of kin and the orphans and the needy and the wayfarer and the beggars and for (the emancipation of) the captives, and keep up prayer and pay the poor-rate; and the performers of their promise when they make a promise, and the patient in distress and affliction and in time of conflicts — these are they who are true (to themselves) and these are they who guard (against evil).
It cannot be stressed often enough, that Islam is under attack everywhere because its system of Divine values is the framework of genuine justice. Exploiters and oppressors oppose Islam because it utterly negates their man-made and therefore unjust systems. Allah (swt) commanded us:

[3.104] And from among you there should be a party who invite to good and enjoin what is right and forbid the wrong, and these it is that shall be successful.
In other words, it is not only a ‘good idea’ for Muslims to unite to defend ourselves from oppression; it is also a religious obligation for us to do so! This could not be otherwise, given the undisputable fact that the entire universe must submit to the One and Only Creator – Allah (swt), who instructed the Holy Prophet Muhammad (S):
[18.110] Say: I am only a mortal like you; it is revealed to me that your god is one God, therefore whoever hopes to meet his Lord, he should do good deeds, and not associate anyone in the service of his Lord.

The doctrine that there is no other god but Allah (swt) – the doctrine of Tawhid – teaches us that there is no part of our deen that we can ignore. Everything is interconnected. Those who merely pray and fast, while ignoring the oppression of their fellow-Muslims (and, for that matter, the oppression of any living creature) are shamefully defective Muslims.

Humanity stands at the crossroads. On one side stands a world system that believes in nothing except immediate advantage for the privileged elites, while humanity as a whole faces endless wars, environmental degradation, and the humiliation of dictatorship, poverty and worse.
On the other, the Divine system of Islam offers humanity a clear, broad and deep worldview which offers society legal and economic bases that have proved both practicable and systematic. We Muslims can either join the Western caravan, which calls itself ‘democracy’, or we can return to Islam and make it fully effective in the field of our own life: spiritual, social and economic. If we make this choice, we can draw strength from our religion and promote its growth.

Allah (swt) promises us [3: 120] that if we place our trust in Him, our enemies will be unable to defeat us:
They may wage wars but they cannot cause a dent in our deen. Allah’s enemies will suffer even if they are armed to their teeth with the latest weapons and the most advanced technology. When they go against Allah (by fighting those humans who have become the will of Allah on earth) they are doomed (Imam Muhammad al-Asi, ‘Introducing the Fourth juz’ of the Holy Qur’an’, in Crescent International, July 2006, 32).
More than ever before, the world stands in need of Islam and its social system – our practical and spiritual system of life. But we must first demonstrate these values in practice.

This is possible even in Australia , by Muslims applying these principles in our own lives, and by striving fearlessly for social justice. An increasingly vibrant Islamic movement is beginning to once more re-emerge globally, struggling to take up this blessed challenge – and not a moment too soon.
It is time for all Muslims to unite together in this struggle for justice, and in the collective striving for the knowledge needed to obtain this.
In some Australian cities, Muslims are beginning to come together, across the divides of madhab and ethnic origin, to energise their iman and to systematically engage in a process of mutual learning. They are forming halaqas (study circles) which seek to collectively understand the principles and methods of Islam for the creation of a world in harmony with Allah (swt), in a country where Muslims comprise a tiny minority.
Prayerful, systematic reflection is the indispensable precondition for effective action to obtain social justice. Muslims in several cities are staying in touch with each other, in an effort to begin to systematically acquire the knowledge that is needed, so that Muslims can begin to once again take charge of our destinies.

This is our social and political responsibility at this point in time, while Awaiting Imam al-Mahdi (as). Imam al-Mahdi (as) will only reappear if the Muslims themselves first initiate a movement for justice. And the indispensable precondition for such a movement is for the Muslims to systematically acquire the knowledge that is needed, if they are to initiate such a movement for justice, inshaAllah.
We can be confident that these efforts will bear good and plentiful fruit, inshaAllah. Allah (swt) tells us:
[2:143] And thus we have made you a just nation that you may be the bearers of witness to the people….

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