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The
Principle of Movement in the Structure of Islam (continued)
Passing on to Turkey, we
find that the idea of Ijtih«d, reinforced and broadened by modern philosophical
ideas, has long been working in the religious and political thought of the Turkish
nation. This is clear from Àalim S«bit’s new theory of Muhammadan Law,
grounded on modern sociological concepts. If the renaissance of Islam is a fact,
and I believe it is a fact, we too one day, like the Turks, will have to re-evaluate
our intellectual inheritance. And if we cannot make any original contribution
to the general thought of Islam, we may, by healthy conservative criticism,
serve at least as a check on the rapid movement of liberalism in the world of
Islam.
I now proceed to give you
some idea of religio-political thought in Turkey which will indicate to you
how the power of Ijtih«d is manifested in recent thought and activity
in that country. There were, a short time ago, two main lines of thought in
Turkey represented by the Nationalist Party and the Party of Religious Reform.
The point of supreme interest with the Nationalist Party is above all the State
and not Religion. With these thinkers religion as such has no independent function.
The state is the essential factor in national life which determines the character
and function of all other factors. They, therefore, reject old ideas about the
function of State and Religion, and accentuate the separation of Church and
State. Now the structure of Islam as a religio-political system, no doubt, does
permit such a view, though personally I think it is a mistake to suppose that
the idea of state is more dominant and rules all other ideas embodied in the
system of Islam. In Islam the spiritual and the temporal are not two distinct
domains, and the nature of an act, however secular in its import, is determined
by the attitude of mind with which the agent does it. It is the invisible mental
background of the act which ultimately determines its character.21
An act is temporal or profane if it is done in a spirit of detachment from the
infinite complexity of life behind it; it is spiritual if it is inspired by
that complexity. In Islam it is the same reality which appears as Church looked
at from one point of view and State from another. It is not true to say that
Church and State are two sides or facets of the same thing. Islam is a single
unanalysable reality which is one or the other as your point of view varies.
The point is extremely far-reaching and a full elucidation of it will involve
us in a highly philosophical discussion. Suffice it to say that this ancient
mistake arose out of the bifurcation of the unity of man into two distinct and
separate realities which somehow have a point of contact, but which are in essence
opposed to each other. The truth, however, is that matter is spirit in space-time
reference. The unity called man is body when you look at it as acting in regard
to what we call the external world; it is mind or soul when you look at it as
acting in regard to the ultimate aim and ideal of such acting. The essence of
Tauhâd, as a working idea, is equality, solidarity, and freedom. The state,
from the Islamic standpoint, is an endeavour to transform these ideal principles
into space-time forces, an aspiration to realize them in a definite human organization.
It is in this sense alone that the state in Islam is a theocracy, not in the
sense that it is headed by a representative of God on earth who can always screen
his despotic will behind his supposed infallibility. The critics of Islam have
lost sight of this important consideration. The Ultimate Reality, according
to the Qur’«n, is spiritual, and its life consists in its temporal activity.
The spirit finds its opportunities in the natural, the material, the secular.
All that is secular is, therefore, sacred in the roots of its being. The greatest
service that modern thought has rendered to Islam, and as a matter of fact to
all religion, consists in its criticism of what we call material or natural
- a criticism which discloses that the merely material has no substance until
we discover it rooted in the spiritual. There is no such thing as a profane
world. All this immensity of matter constitutes a scope for the self-realization
of spirit. All is holy ground. As the Prophet so beautifully puts it: ‘The
whole of this earth is a mosque.’22 The state, according to
Islam, is only an effort to realize the spiritual in a human organization. But
in this sense all state, not based on mere domination and aiming at the realization
of ideal principles, is theocratic.
The truth is that the Turkish
Nationalists assimilated the idea of the separation of Church and State from
the history of European political ideas. Primitive Christianity was founded,
not as a political or civil unit, but as a monastic order in a profane world,
having nothing to do with civil affairs, and obeying the Roman authority practically
in all matters. The result of this was that when the State became Christian,
State and Church confronted each other as distinct powers with interminable
boundary disputes between them. Such a thing could never happen in Islam; for
Islam was from the very beginning a civil society, having received from the
Qur’«n a set of simple legal principles which, like the twelve tables of
the Romans, carried, as experience subsequently proved, great potentialities
of expansion and development by interpretation. The Nationalist theory of state,
therefore, is misleading inasmuch as it suggests a dualism which does not exist
in Islam.
The Religious Reform Party,
on the other hand, led by Sa‘âd Àalâm P«sh«, insisted on the fundamental
fact that Islam is a harmony of idealism and positivism; and, as a unity of
the eternal verities of freedom, equality, and solidarity, has no fatherland.
‘As there is no English Mathematics, German Astronomy or French Chemistry,’
says the Grand Vizier, ‘so there is no Turkish, Arabian, Persian or Indian
Islam. Just as the universal character of scientific truths engenders varieties
of scientific national cultures which in their totality represent human knowledge,
much in the same way the universal character of Islamic verities creates varieties
of national, moral and social ideals.’ Modern culture based as it is on
national egoism is, according to this keen-sighted writer, only another form
of barbarism. It is the result of an over-developed industrialism through which
men satisfy their primitive instincts and inclinations. He, however, deplores
that during the course of history the moral and social ideals of Islam have
been gradually deislamized through the influence of local character, and pre-Islamic
superstitions of Muslim nations. These ideals today are more Iranian, Turkish,
or Arabian than Islamic. The pure brow of the principle of Tauhâd has received
more or less an impress of heathenism, and the universal and impersonal character
of the ethical ideals of Islam has been lost through a process of localization.
The only alternative open to us, then, is to tear off from Islam the hard crust
which has immobilized an essentially dynamic outlook on life, and to rediscover
the original verities of freedom, equality, and solidarity with a view to rebuild
our moral, social, and political ideals out of their original simplicity and
universality. Such are the views of the Grand Vizier of Turkey. You will see
that following a line of thought more in tune with the spirit of Islam, he reaches
practically the same conclusion as the Nationalist Party, that is to say, the
freedom of Ijtih«d with a view to rebuild the laws of Sharâ‘ah in
the light of modern thought and experience.
Let us now see how the
Grand National Assembly has exercised this power of Ijtih«d in regard
to the institution of Khil«fat. According to Sunni Law, the appointment of an
Imam or Khalâfah is absolutely indispensable. The first question that arises
in this connexion is this - Should the Caliphate be vested in a single person?
Turkey’s Ijtih«d is that according to the spirit of Islam the Caliphate
or Imamate can be vested in a body of persons, or an elected Assembly. The religious
doctors of Islam in Egypt and India, as far as I know, have not yet expressed
themselves on this point. Personally, I believe the Turkish view is perfectly
sound. It is hardly necessary to argue this point. The republican form of government
is not only thoroughly consistent with the spirit of Islam, but has also become
a necessity in view of the new forces that are set free in the world of Islam.
In order to understand
the Turkish view let us seek the guidance of Ibn Khaldën - the first philosophical
historian of Islam. Ibn Khaldën, in his famous ‘Prolegomena’, mentions
three distinct views of the idea of Universal Caliphate in Islam23:
(1) That Universal Imamate is a Divine institution, and is consequently indispensable.
(2) That it is merely a matter of expediency. (3) That there is no need of such
an institution. The last view was taken by the Khaw«rij.24 It seems
that modern Turkey has shifted from the first to the second view, i.e. to the
view of the Mu’tazilah who regarded Universal Imamate as a matter of expediency
only. The Turks argue that in our political thinking we must be guided by our
past political experience which points unmistakably to the fact that the idea
of Universal Imamate has failed in practice. It was a workable idea when the
Empire of Islam was intact. Since the break-up of this Empire independent political
units have arisen. The idea has ceased to be operative and cannot work as a
living factor in the organization of modern Islam. Far from serving any useful
purpose it has really stood in the way of a reunion of independent Muslim States.
Persia has stood aloof from the Turks in view of her doctrinal differences regarding
the Khil«fat; Morocco has always looked askance at them, and Arabia has cherished
private ambition. And all these ruptures in Islam for the sake of a mere symbol
of a power which departed long ago. Why should we not, they can further argue,
learn from experience in our political thinking? Did not Q«dâ Abë Bakr B«qil«nâ
drop the condition of Qarshâyat in the Khalâfah in view of the facts
of experience, i.e. the political fall of the Quraish and their consequent inability
to rule the world of Islam? Centuries ago Ibn Khaldën, who personally believed
in the condition of Qarshâyat in the Khali`fah, argued much in the same
way. Since the power of the Quraish, he says, has gone, there is no alternative
but to accept the most powerful man as Ima`m in the country where he happens
to be powerful. Thus Ibn Khaldën, realizing the hard logic of facts, suggests
a view which may be regarded as the first dim vision of an International Islam
fairly in sight today. Such is the attitude of the modern Turk, inspired as
he is by the realities of experience, and not by the scholastic reasoning of
jurists who lived and thought under different conditions of life.
To my mind these arguments,
if rightly appreciated, indicate the birth of an International ideal which,
though forming the very essence of Islam, has been hitherto over-shadowed or
rather displaced by Arabian Imperialism of the earlier centuries of Islam. This
new ideal is clearly reflected in the work of the great nationalist poet Êiy«
whose songs, inspired by the philosophy of Auguste Comte, have done a great
deal in shaping the present thought of Turkey. I reproduce the substance of
one of his poems from Professor Fischer’s German translation:
In order to create a really
effective political unity of Islam, all Muslim countries must first become independent:
and then in their totality they should range themselves under one Caliph. Is
such a thing possible at the present moment? If not today, one must wait. In
the meantime the Caliph must reduce his own house to order and lay the foundations
of a workable modern State.
‘In the International
world the weak find no sympathy; power alone deserves respect.’25
These lines clearly indicate
the trend of modern Islam. For the present every Muslim nation must sink into
her own deeper self, temporarily focus her vision on herself alone, until all
are strong and powerful to form a living family of republics. A true and living
unity, according to the nationalist thinkers, is not so easy as to be achieved
by a merely symbolical overlordship. It is truly manifested in a multiplicity
of free independent units whose racial rivalries are adjusted and harmonized
by the unifying bond of a common spiritual aspiration. It seems to me that God
is slowly bringing home to us the truth that Islam is neither Nationalism nor
Imperialism but a League of Nations which recognizes artificial boundaries and
racial distinctions for facility of reference only,26 and not for
restricting the social horizon of its members.
From the same poet the
following passage from a poem called ‘Religion and Science’ will throw
some further light on the general religious outlook which is being gradually
shaped in the world of Islam today:
"Who were the first
spiritual leaders of mankind? Without doubt the prophets and holy men. In every
period religion has led philosophy; From it alone morality and art receive light.
But then religion grows weak, and loses her original ardour! Holy men disappear,
and spiritual leadership becomes, in name, the heritage of the Doctors of Law!
The leading star of the Doctors of Law is tradition; They drag religion with
force on this track; but philosophy says: ‘My leading star is reason: you
go right, I go left."
‘Both religion and
philosophy claim the soul of man and draw it on either side!’
‘When this struggle
is going on pregnant experience delivers up positive science, and this young
leader of thought says, "Tradition is history and Reason is the method
of history! Both interpret and desire to reach the same indefinable something!"
‘But what is this
something?’
‘Is it a spiritualized heart?’
‘If so, then take
my last word - Religion is positive science, the purpose of which is to spiritualize
the heart of man!’27
It is clear from these
lines how beautifully the poet has adopted the Comtian idea of the three stages
of man’s intellectual development, i.e. theological, metaphysical and scientific
- to the religious outlook of Islam. And the view of religion embodied in these
lines determines the poet’s attitude towards the position of Arabic in
the educational system of Turkey. He says:
‘The land where the
call to prayer resounds in Turkish; where those who pray understand the meaning
of their religion; the land where the Qur’«n is learnt in Turkish; where
every man, big or small, knows full well the command of God; O! Son of Turkey!
that land is thy fatherland!’28
Page [1,
2, 3, 4]
[See
Notes]
Date/Time Last Modified: 6/18/2002 8:03:42 AM
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