Muhammads legacy

Books exploring the message of Muhammads life for the present day and the Sufi tradition of South Asia.

TARIQ RAMADAN is a Muslim Martin Luther, The Washington Post once remarked. It is doubtful whether he would accept such ignorant and condescending praise. Born in Switzerland and brought up in Geneva in the 1970s, his maternal grandfather was Hasan al-Banna, founder of the Muslim Brotherhood, and his father was Said Ramadan, a founder of the Muslim World League.

Professor Jonathan Lawrence writes of him: As an interpreter of the Islamic tradition who works across boundaries as well as within them, Ramadan has made himself indispensable both to religious reform in Islam and to the political integration of Muslims in the West. He has met with British Prime Minister Tony Blair and European Union Commission President Romano Prodi and has academic appointments of both Oxford University and Erasmus University Rotterdam. At the same time, however, his anti-establishment modus operandi has led nervous officials in Cairo and Riyadh as well as in Washington (and, temporarily, Paris) to banish him from their territories. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security denied Ramadan& #8217;s two-year-old visa application, which would have allowed him to take up an academic position at the University of Notre Dame, on the grounds that he had contributed some $900 to a Palestinian charity later linked to Hamas. (At the time of the donation, the charity was not on U.S. list of terrorist organisations.)

In 2003, Ramadan debated on television with Frances Interior Minister Nicholas Sarkozy, now its President. His earlier work Western Muslims and the Future of Islam was widely noticed (see the writers review, Mus lims of the West, Frontline, October 21, 2005). But it was far less noticed than was the trash that came from the likes of Irshad Manji and Ayaan Hirsi Ali, both noisily flamboyant without any pretence to scholarship. That the M uslim who denounces Muslims is acclaimed as the liberal speaks more for the society that acclaims them than for those who profit by the acclaim. Forty years ago, the head of the Muslim branch of Maharashtras Criminal Investigation Department actively promoted two such: one a Muslim journalist, the other a non-Muslim academic, both innocent of scholarship. Both prospered.

Tariq Ramadan will receive ignorant stereotyping (moderate) and the like. Even in a largely sympathetic review in Foreign Affairs (May-June 2007), Lawrence betrays the kind of ignorance we saw in British rulers who bra nded Tilak and others as advocates of terrorism because they pointed out that repression by the state breeds terrorism among the repressed. Ramadan holds: On ethical grounds, its wrong. On political grounds, theres a connection. Lawrence, however, sees a disconnect between his descriptive explanations and his prescriptive condemnations. This, for a European Muslim who believes that Islam is not a closed value system and reminds Muslims that the fundamentals of Islams creed (al-aqidah) and ritual practice (al-ibadat) were not subject to change, nor were the essential principles of ethics, but the implementation of those ethical principles and the response to new situations, about which scriptural sources had remained vague or silent, required answers adapted to particular circumstances.

Tariq Ramadans writings are of profound relevance to Indian Muslims because, as a European, his concern is the role of Muslims in a non-Muslim society and the faith and practice of Islam in that environment. He is little noticed in India, however. His biography of Prophet Muhammad is written for the Muslim as well as the non-Muslim reader. It is based on classical Islamic works and is written with intellectual rigour and in a lucid style. It is, however, written to draw lesson and inspiration for the conditions of modern times. His devotion to the Prophet is evident in every single page of the book.

In the seventh century, at the heart of a specific social, political, and cultural environment, Gods Messenger acted, reacted, and expressed himself about human beings and events in the name of his faith, in the light of his morals. Studying his actions in this particular historical and geographical setting should enable us to throw light on a number of principles about the relation of faith to human beings, brotherhood, love, adversity, community life, justice, laws, and war. We have therefore endeavoured to approach Muhammads life from the perspective of our own times, considering how it still speaks to us and what its contemporary teachings are.

The reader, whether Muslim or not, is thus invited to look into the Prophets life and follow the steps of an account that is strictly faithful to classical biographies (as far as facts and chronology are concerned) but which nevertheless constantly introduces reflections and comments, of a spiritual, philosophical, social, judicial, political, or cultural nature, inspired by the facts narrated The reader will notice constant movements between the Prophets life, the Quran, and the teachings relevant to spirituality and the present-day situation that can be drawn from the various historical situations.

Such was the love which the Prophet inspired that when Umar ibn al-Khattab heard of the Prophets death, he threatened to kill whoever dared claim that the Prophet was dead; he had only been raised to heaven and would assuredly come back. But another of Muhammads Companions, Abu Bakr, asked Umar to be quiet, and declared: O you people, let those who worshipped Muhammad know that Muhammad is now dead! As for those who worshipped God, let them know that God is alive and does not die.

Then he recited the following verse: Muhammad is no more than a messenger; many were the messengers who passed away before him. If he died or was killed, will you then turn back? If any did turn back, nor the least harm will be done to God. But God will reward the thankful.

The fundamentalist would read misread, really the text literally and pervert the religion to subserve his political ends. The faith is itself rooted in ethics and compassion. From its fundamentals, political consequences do follow.

Justice is a condition for peace, and the Prophet kept insisting that one cannot experience the taste of equity if one is unable to respect the dignity of individuals. He set slaves free and recommended that Muslims pledge to do so constantly; the faith community of believers had to be a community of free beings In the Muslim community, a black man called the believers to prayer, and a slaves son commanded the army; faith had freed the believers from judgments based on deceptive appearances (linked to origin and social status) that stimulate unwise passions and dehumanise them.

Among the legacies Prophet Muhammad left behind were love of learning and the mystic quest. Sufism is authentically Islamic. India is singularly fortunate to be home to a galaxy of Sufi saints. Chief among them is Khwaja Moinuddin Chishti of Ajmer, popularly known as Gharib Nawaz patron of the poor. He belonged to the Chishti Silsilah (order) of Sufis. The other Silsilahs were Qadaria, Suhrawardy, Naqshabandi and Maulawi, named after Maulana Rumi. Sufism, especially its Chishti order, has enriched India.

Gharib Nawaz died in 1236. Shaikh Qutbuddin Bakhtiyar Kaki, widely regarded his heir, died in 1235 and is buried in Mehrauli on the outskirts of Delhi. Another pupil, Hamiduddin Sufi Suwali (d. 1276), a vegetarian, worked in a rural area, Nagaur in Rajasthan. Baba Fariduddin Ganj-i-Shakar (d. 1265) is buried in Pakpattan in Pakistan. He was greatly influenced in his youth by Shaikh Qutub. Delhi can claim two more Chishti saints Shaikh Nasiruddin, Chiragh-e-Delhi (Lamp of Delhi; d. 1356) and the legendary Nizamuddin Auliya (d. 1325) whom Amir Khusrau so dearly loved. The most celebrated pupil of Chiragh-e-Delhi was Muhammad Hussain Gesu Deraz of Gulbarga.

Prof. Khaliq Ahmad Nizami was a scholar of highest distinction on Indian Sufism. This is a new edition of his masterly work, which appeared over a decade ago, on the Delhi saint Shaikh Nizamuddin Auliya (1244-1325), a successor to the major Sufi saint of Punjab Shaikh Fariduddin Ganj-i-Shakar.

As Prof. Bruce B. Lawrence of Duke University mentions in his Foreword, The merit of the present book is that Nizami follows his own admonition. He applies fairly and firmly the principles of criticism (usul-i-asnad) laid dow n by medieval scholars. In seventeen chapters he evokes the life of the major Chishti saint of Delhi: his birth into an immigrant Muslim family; his life as a fatherless child; his zest for knowledge that carried him, his mother, and sister to Delhi; his devotion to Shaikh Farid-ud-din Ganj-i-Shakar; his work for 60 years (1265-1325) as the leader of the Chishti order in Delhi; and finally his influence on subsequent generations of Muslims, and non-Muslims all are portrayed here with scrupulous attention to what is knowable and laudable, while rejecting, or calling into question, what is imputed but improbable and often regrettable.

Nizami does full justice to the saints most famous devotee, the great poet Amir Khusrau, who claimed that his disciples trod the same path that Shibli and Ibrahim Adham had traversed. Whoever joined his discipline immortalised himself. People looked upon him as the Qutb of the times. As sovereign of the spiritual realm, he was deemed to have bestowed spiritual territories on his disciples. He was the refuge and asylum of people against calamities and misfortunes. Throughout the centuries that followed the Shaikhs death, his tomb was visited alike by kings, nobles, scholars, Sufis, the rich, and the poor. Muhammad bin Tughluq, who had carried the Shaikhs bier on his shoulders, constructed a mausoleum over his grave. Firuz Shah Tughluq made several additions to it When Babur reached Delhi he made a circuit of the luminous mausoleum of Shaikh Nizam-ud-din Auliya and then encamped on the bank of the river Jumna. Akbar selected for his fathers burial a place near the khanqab of the Shaikh. All the Mughal rulers from Akbar to Bahadur Shah Zafar visited his tomb for blessing and benediction. When an attempt on Akbars life in Delhi failed, he attributed it to the blessings of the Shaikh whose grave he had visited just before the incident. When facing Khusraus rebellion, Jahangir visited the tomb of the Shaikh. Muhammad Shah was buried at the foot of the Shaikhs tomb. The rulers of the South also displayed great respect and veneration for Shaikh Nizam-ud-din Auliya. Finding a place for burial in the vicinity of the Shaikhs tomb was regarded as a special blessing. From Amir Khusrau to Ghalib, from Khan-i-Jahan Maqbul to Aziz Kokaltash, from Zia-ud-din Barani to Sir Shah Sulaiman, many celebrities lie buried in and around the complex.

In 1922, the Archaeological Survey of India published a monograph, A Guide to Nizamud Din by Maulvi Zafar Hasan, B.A., an Assistant Superintendent of the Survey. It was published by the Superintendent, Government Printing, Calcutta, for Rupees 5, annas 4 (Rs.5.25). It is a work of great labour and deserves to be reprinted by the government now, with photographic illustrations of Shaikh Nizamuddin Auliyas tomb and its environs.

Islam does not recognise priesthood, yet the clergy, the ulema, wield power and influence in many Muslim countries. There is a rich tradition of ulema of integrity and learning who provided intellectual and religi ous leadership to the community. Also a sorry record of ulema in the service of the state; you see some supporting the Bharatiya Janata Party today. Muhammad Qasim Zaman is Professor of Near Eastern Studies and Religion at Princeton Un iversity. He rejects the notion that the ulema have become redundant. The book is focussed on South Asia. He holds that the ulama have not only continued to respond admittedly, with varying degrees of enthusiasm and succ ess to the challenges of changing times; they have also been successful in enhancing their influence in a number of contemporary Muslim societies, in broadening their audiences, in making significant contributions to public discourses, and even in setting the terms for such discourses. In many cases, they have also come to play significant religiopolitical activist roles in contemporary Islam. The ulamas institutions of learning have grown dramatically in recent decades.

It examines, in particular, one highly visible and influential strand among the ulama, those belonging to the Deobandi sectarian and doctrinal orientation. This orientation is associated with a madrassa ( religious school) founded in Deoband in Uttar Pradesh in 1867. Thousands of other madrassas all called Deobandi, though often without any formal affiliation with the parent madrassa, share the same doctrinal orientation. It emphasises the study of law and of the traditions attributed to the Prophet Muhammad (hadith), as well as a self-consciously reformist ideology defined in opposition to existing forms of popular Muslim belief and practice. Within modern South Asian Islam, the Deobandis distinguish themselves not only from the Shia but also from other Sunni rivals such as the Barelawis and the Ahl-i-Hadith, both of which also emerged in India in the second half of the nineteenth century. Though these three movements are united in their reverence for the teachings of the Prophet, their interpretations of the sources of religious authority differ markedly. The Barelawis affirm the authority not just of the Prophet but also of the saints and holy people, whom they revere as sources of religious guidance and vehicles of mediation between God and human beings. It is against such a vision of shrine and cult-based Islam that the Deobandis have preached. The Ahl-i-Hadith, for their part, deny the legitimacy not just of all practices lacking a basis in scriptural texts, but even of the classical schools of law, stringently insisting on the Quran and hadith as the exclusive and directly accessible so urces of guidance.

The author examines the ulemas contribution in the colonial period to the debate on Islamic law, what was in force and is still in force in India. It is Anglo-Muhammadan law, not Islamic law. The Deobandi ulema& #8217;s rulings were based on a strict reading of the law. An important section opposed the demand for Pakistan and supported the Congress. At a time when madrassas have come under attack, this book provides an informed corrective.

The secular state did, indeed, recognise its Muslim citizens as comprising a distinct cultural and religious community, and as Yohanan Friedmann has observed, it attempted to place the ulama and Muslims who were, or became, closely associated with them in a role of leadership in the Muslim community. Since independence, the ulama have continued to energetically expand the reach of their educational institutions. Of the 576 madrasas surveyed in a recent report on institutions of Islamic education in India, 99 were established between 1901 and 1950, and 449 between 1951 and 1994. Two of South Asias most prestigious institutions of Islamic learning the Dar al-Ulum of Deoband and the Dar al-Ulum of Nadwat al-Uluma, Lucknow, both located in Uttar Pradesh have seen remarkable growth in recent decades.

The authors thorough survey of South Asias ulema ends with a dismal conclusion: Most of the ulama whose work we have considered in this book eschew a radical reform of rethinking of their tradition, however. A w holehearted recognition that the tradition requires major changes and that the ulama ought to set themselves on the path of bringing those about has been rare. Yet the lack of such an acknowledgement (which itself represents a reasoned position and ought to be seen as such) has not precluded changes of varying significance. New ways of conceptualising the sharia, efforts to reach new audiences, new conceptions of religion and of the ulamas position in society and polity, and new roles of religious and political activism are, as we have seen in the preceding chapters, some of the many facets of change that continue to sweep through the world of the ulama.

The challenge before Muslims is to reclaim the legacy of Prohet Muhammad by recourse to the path of ijtihad exertion of reason to evolve solutions to the problems of this day and age as Islam itself ordains.

Francis Robinsons essays are, as one might expect, insightful. Two are particularly so. One is on the ulema in South Asia, the other on the Farangi Mahal of Lucknow, which resisted reform. Ulama, the Islamic intelligen tsia, have always played the key role in sustaining the Islamic quality of Muslim societies. As scholars they have reflected upon the significance of the central messages of Islam for their time, as teachers they have transmitted these messages and the skills to make them socially useful to the coming generations, and as muftis, and in other ways, they have interpreted these messages, whether as law or as general moral guidance, to society at large. It was a role of great importance, he holds as he surveys their institutions of learning, particularly Farangi Mahal.

Its fate is saddening and instructive. From their arrival in Lucknow in the later 17th century to the early 20th, they ignored the environment around them. Those who remained in British India were confronted not just by a state machine in which Muslims would have to engage with other peoples and cultures on terms not of their own making, but also by a growing public sphere in which they failed to engage with others at their peril. This sphere was there in the press, in the local, provincial, and national arenas of politics, in the political organisations that formed to compete in these arenas, and in the new associations which formed to pursue activities ranging from film and literature to tennis and cricket. Here were opportunities to work together in public, even if they did not do so in private. A few took these opportunities, and it helped to have an income to enable them to do so. Most, however, either continued to live together separately in the new India, sustaining fragments of the once all-powerful Sharif culture, or largely for financial reasons left India for Pakistan, West Asia, Britain and North America.