Book review: Islam Under Siege by Akbar S. Ahmed

The day after the second series of bomb blasts in London on July 21st, General Musharraf, in a televised address to his captive nation said, in the part directly addressed to Mr. Tony Blair that, while he unequivocally condemned “terrorism” in all its forms, Britain should look after its own home grown terrorists and not point fingers at Pakistan. This sort of mealy-mouthed “defence” has had a patent applied for by Musharraf. But he added something that I wholeheartedly agree with. The word “Ilm” (meaning knowledge) is the second most frequently found word in the Quran after “Allah”. If Islam is to become a religious force in this modern world it should concentrate on “Ilm” and modernise itself to meet the demands of today’s world. This is precisely the point that is also made by Mr. Akbar S. Ahmed in his extremely readable book, "Islam Under Siege" (Vistaar Publications, New Delhi).

First some facts: Mr. Ahmed is a former High Commissioner of Pakistan in London and presently holds the Ibn Khaldun Chair of Islamic Studies at the American University, Washington DC. Ibn Khaldun was one of the greatest liberals in the history of Islam, which speaks a lot for Mr. Ahmed himself. He is a former Pakistan Superior Civil Service Officer who won his spurs in an open competitive examination – the Pakistani equivalent of the India Foreign Service and a former Iqbal Fellow at Cambridge. These, I think, are qualifications formidable enough not to be easily challenged as far as the book is concerned, to establish his credentials

Mr. Ahmed assumes that Islam is a religion that preaches “peace and goodwill towards all men”. It is here that I have a bone to pick with him. But first a small aside: Mr. Ahmed approvingly quotes the speech in favour of a secular Pakistan made by Mr. Jinnah in the Constituent Assembly, latterly made controversial by a reference to it by Mr. Advani during his recent visit to Pakistan. The BJP’s theatrics were unnecessary because all Mr. Advani was telling the Pakistanis was that the founder of their nation was secular and so should they be. They of course politely ignored him, at least publicly.

The fact however was, like Mr. Advani, Mr. Jinnah was a political opportunist with an eye on the main chance. He found it when some undergraduate at an English university coined the term “Pakistan”, and decided that he would go for a separate homeland for the Muslims of India, more to perpetuate his own greatness than, in fact, to do anything for Islam. The Muslims of Pakistan realise this, though openly stating it would be considered “blasphemous”, much as criticism of Mahatma Gandhi is today in India. (We on the subcontinent love our idols, the Pakistanis just as much as us; hence the Quaid’s likeness on every Pakistani currency note which goes against Islamic injunctions.) Luckily for him, like Gandhi, he died early enough for his greatness to be safely mummified for perpetual veneration. Advani, likewise found his main chance in Ayodhya. He is now looking for chances to perpetuate his own greatness. Whether it will do the Hindus any good here or hereafter is a matter of doubt. Whether it will afford the same greatness for Mr. Advani is a matter of much greater doubt because of the secular traditions of the society he lives in.

It is much better to quote Mr. Ahmed quoting the Quran to make something out of what that says. The reason for this is that for every amenable platitude that the Quran decrees, it almost always also decrees diametrically opposite injunctions to its followers. Mr. Ahmed himself stresses this at the beginning of the book:

"The answer is that both Muslims and non-Muslims use the Quran selectively. The Quranic verses revealed earlier for example, Surah 2: Verses 190-4 emphasise peace and reconciliation in comparison to the latter ones like Surah 9: Verse 5. Some activists have argued that this means an abrogation of the earlier verses and therefore advocate aggressive militancy. In fact the verses have to be understood in the social and political context in which they were formed. They must be read both for the particular situation ion which they were revealed and the general principle which they embody." He goes on to add, "What is important for Muslims is to stand up for their rights whoever the aggressor", "Fight against those who fight against you, but begin not hostilities", the Quran tells Muslims (Surah 2: Verse 190)."

What does an impartial reader make of this when Mr. Ahmed also says the following: “The first warrior to make a name for and in South Asian Islam was the young commander Mohammad bin Qasim. He landed on the coast of what is now Karachi and conquered what is now the Pakistan province of Sind for Islam in the early years of the 8th century. He was defamed by his enemies and without a proper trial he was sent back to Baghdad, the seat of the Islamic kingdom. He suffocated to death…. It was not the accusation of sexual harassment by the Indian princesses, which they later recanted, but the arbitrary manner of the punishment.”
Mentioning Mahmud of Ghazni on page 147 he says this: “For most Muslims he is one of the greatest heroes of Islam, bringing their faith to the region and carrying it with the power of the sword….Smashing idols is thus a powerful symbol of faith for those who believe their monotheistic God is jealous of any images that distract from His worship. Even today Muslims thorough out South Asia – not only in Afghanistan – quote Iqbal’s popular verse, proudly declaring that a true Muslim is an idol breaker not an idol seller.” (emphasis mine).
The Quran contains fairly liberal and conciliatory statements made during the Prophet’s early years during which he received revelations in Mecca. After his flight to Medina the revelations gradually started to become less tolerant as I quote below from Akbar Ahmed’s book and from other sources:

1. Recite O Unbelievers, I worship not what you worship and you do not worship what I worship. I shall never worship what you worship. Neither will you worship what I worship. To you your religion, to me my religion. Surah 109).
2. There is no compulsion in religion. (surah 2.256)
3. We well know what the infidels say: but you are not to compel them ( Surah 50.45)
4. Killing a single innocent person is like killing all of humanity, warns the Quran (surah 5: verse 32) (Ahmed)
5. Forgive and be indulgent (to the people of the book, Jews and Christians (Surahs 2 and 109) (Ahmed). Apparently this does not apply to that third of humanity that does not subscribe to these three religions.
   

Against this:

1. Slay the idolaters wherever you find them. (Surah 9.5).
2. Kill those who join other gods with God wherever you may find them. ( Surah 9.5-6)
3. I will instill terror into the hearts of the Infidels,strike of their heads then, and strike of from them every fingertip. (Surah 8.12).
4. Say to the Infidels: If they desist from their unbelief, what is now past shall be forgiven them; but if they return to it, they have already before them the doom of the ancients! Fight then against them till strife be at an end, and the religion be all of it God’s. (Surah 8.39-42).

Akbar Ahmed attributes the feeling of “Islam under siege”to “hyper-assabiya” which he defines as exaggerated tribal and religious loyalties and to the impression gathered by the Islamic world that it has entered a “post-honour” world – a situation that must be set right. That a “siege mentality” exists, is felt most keenly by orthodox Muslims, that it is being encouraged and attempts are made to persuade/force (pace bin Laden) the non-Muslim world to “lift the siege”, there is no doubt. But a careful analysis shows that it has nothing to do with post-honour or hyper-assabiya.

Besides the same can be said for other white and non-white populations, which follow different religions, but none of them are complaining that their religions are under siege.

The fact is that the communications revolution has become the greatest and most insidious enemy of all forms of absolutist thought. It was primarily responsible for the destruction and fall of communism all over the world. This revolution is seen in Muslim countries and by Islamic authority in general as having originated in the degraded (read post-honour) West. The communications revolution is quintessentially anti-Islamic because it encourages free thought and critical enquiry by the mere fact of encouraging curiosity. It thereby “attacks” the very essence at the core of Islam – that it is the last and final world of God.

But the feeling of siege cannot be attributed to the communications revolution publicly, since that would amount to acknowledging the illiberality of orthodox Islam. A roundabout way has to be found to explain the siege mentality. Hence hyper-assabiya and the post-honour world. (Tell me, how does it concern orthodox Muslims in say, Saudi Arabia, what Bill Clinton does with Monica Lewinsky in the privacy of a room in Washington – something about which Akbar Ahmed expresses unctuous outrage?).

Throughout his book Mr. Ahmed’s humanism shines right through. He comes across as a broad minded, liberal author who has understood and empathizes with the problem of Islam faces the world over. The task of showing how Islam is under siege is therefore not easy. But he does make a valiant attempt. Unfortunately for him, the more humane, moderate, modern, broad-minded and “inclusivist” (his own word) Mr. Ahmed sounds, the less Islamic he sounds.

It is a warning to signs of liberalism within Islam. As a result, condemning the fate of other liberal authors, Mr. Ahmed writes from the safe confines of Washington.

Polytheism as an antidote to monotheistic intolerance

Anticipating by some years Jasper Griffin’s article in the Spectator of April 13, 2006, my brother-in-law, as agnostic a member of the Hindu community as I myself, half-seriously suggested in 1997 that Hinduism should incorporate into its pantheon of gods, both Jesus and Mohammad. We have done that to Lord Buddha, Bhagwan Mahavira and Guru Nanak. It would make for an all-encompassing religion that included both these religions and thus remove all possible antagonisms between them and Hinduism. He went on to add, tongue firmly in cheek that, to accommodate atheists and agnostics like himself and me, Hinduism should also add to its pantheon two new gods called “Agnosticeshwara” and “Atheisteswara” (Ishwara = God).

Jasper Griffin’s article, interesting as it is in its exposition of the intolerance of monotheism when contrasted with polytheistic religions like Hinduism, unfortunately seems to accept that it is possible to have a set of strong beliefs, not necessarily scientifically proved, which can be more tolerant than the book beliefs of the middle east.

In accepting a number of Gods who may or may not be only partially successful in answering prayers, Hinduism, as a way of life, treats religion as a hesitant and perhaps unsure way to salvation. It is this hesitance and the need to make doubly sure (which then becomes never ending) that makes religions like Hinduism accept the essence of agnosticism. Mr. Griffin has touched on this point with felicity. However it is still a faith, not based on evidence just as much as are the book religions, and therefore just as subject to the self imposed limitations of accepting as truth that which is not supported by evidence.

While it is true that the book beliefs, all of them, have been the scourges of mankind and have caused untold misery, and that all three are monotheistic, it does not necessarily mean that polytheistic faiths are necessarily tolerant. Monotheistic faiths direct their aggression outward towards those who are “unbelievers”, while polytheistic faiths tend to subjugate their own adherents with myth laden rubbish like caste and sati. At the same time it is also true that a religion like Hinduism allows agnostics like myself to exist within itself. Unless one looked at polytheistic religions as merely the lesser of the two evils, and not necessarily as an antidote to monotheism, one would not be giving the evil of religion its due.

This brings me to the strange case of the coexistence of Hinduism with the religion of the Parsees – Zoroastrianism. Zoroastrianism is a monotheistic religion just like the other religions of the middle east. Yet it coexists peacefully with a polytheistic religion like Hinduism in India. What is it that makes it so special? Why can the other monotheistic religions not be like Zoroastrianism? The answer seems to lie in their different approaches to proselytisation. Zoroastrianism does not accept converts. It offers spiritual succour to those born within the faith, and to none else. As a result no Hindu can covert to Zoroastrianism. This leads to a situation in which two religions, perhaps less intolerant of each other than the book religions but intolerant nevertheless, live in peace in a spirit of benign mutual social ostracism. The Parsees mind their own business and do the Hindus no harm. The Hindus do the same to the Parsees. Hindu Parsee weddings are rare. While a Parsee bride married to a Hindu may be accepted into Hinduism, a Hindu groom is not only not accepted into Zoroastrianism but the Parsee bride is also shooed away. Only now has Zoroastrianism started to accept children born of Parsee-Hindu unions if the father is a Parsee. Zoroastrianism is the best example of how a monotheistic religion can live peaceably with polytheism.

What is surprising is that mankind has lived in the lap of superstition and religions of various kinds ever since it became sentient and started calling itself Homo Sapiens – the Homo that thinks. Even if we accept that human history goes back some fifty thousand years that is about the time that it has lived with and created and glorified all the gods that it could create or imagine. During this long period it has been able, through its religions to think up all sorts of ways to torture and bring to harm its own species. Having done so with marked success for so long, it should have come to the conclusion by now that the unreasoning sets of beliefs that it follows is responsible for all the misery that it causes to itself; and abandoned religion and belief in God altogether. It has done nothing of the sort.

This leads to only one conclusion: That in the face of a complete absence of evidence that religion, any religion does any good to mankind, we still do the rounds and boost the "babas" and "sants". We still persecute those who do not subscribe to our silly beliefs. And we would rather build a temple or mosque or church than an educational institution that taught us how to think. Something is seriously wrong with the mental makeup of mankind.