Islam and Politics: Post-Mortem of a Tradition

The umma is experiencing difficulties because it marginalized the Book of Allah. The umma drifted from revelation because it refrained from reason, the God-given faculty that enables understanding and acquiring knowledge, including knowledge of revelation. This transpired under the influence of ulema that had minimal use for reason. The umma retreated from reason under pressure from tradition. There was a struggle between the rationalists and the traditionists regarding the better way to understand and follow revelation. Traditionists argued that the preferred way to understand and follow revelation was to follow the ways of the forefathers, by flowing tradition. Rationalists, by comparison, argued that the right way to understand revelation was through reason. Traditionists did not agree, and as they could not defeat the rationalists using arguments, as they were not well versed in reasoning, they turned to violence. They exterminated five-thousand rationalists in 786, during the reign of Musa al-Hadi, in a pogrom reminiscent of the Reign of Terror, that transpired in 1792, a millennium afterwards in revolutionary France. It appears that "orthodoxy" was established by force in both. Sixteen thousand supporters of the monarchy were put to death in revolutionary France at the time of the rule of Maximilien Robespierre and the Jacobins. In Islam, it was the rationalists that were persecuted by the traditionists. The umma turned from revelation to tradition, to follow the paths of the forefathers, recorded in the books of traditions. "In the eyes of our honourable scholars there is no question that God appointed them not only as the guardians of His religion but also as the intermediaries between Him and the people, as the translators of His orders and prohibitions, and as the commentators of His verses and rules." (Shahrur, 2009:390). There was a re-orientation from the Book of Allah to the books of tradition, from revelation to the ways of the forefathers. Traditional Islam - base upon traditions - altered the meaning of words. For example, the word hikma in the Book of Allah, which means wisdom, was rendered as the sunna of the prophet. This rendering of the term hikma is tantamount to a falsification of the term. It reflects an anti-intellectual bias and is designed to reinforce taqlid, or the unquestioning following of the forefathers. The rendition of the term hikma as the tradition of the prophet reflects a bias against thinking. The bias against thinking was reinforced by al-Ghazali who recommended that thinkers be put to death for heresy. By attempting to reorient persons from the Book of Allah to the books of traditions, this rendering of the term hikma in fact entices Muslims away from the path of righteousness to follow the forefathers. A few ulema assert that there is no morality outside of revelation. This would mean that people that all persons that did not receive the benefit of revelation cannot possibly act ethically. Persons that assert that there is no ethics based upon reason disregard the fact that it is reason that enables us to foresee the effects of our actions. But to reject causality is not just to reject morality; it is also to reject morality derived from revelation. It was the disregard of the relationship between cause and effect that caused major catastrophes, for example the Abbasids killing Mongol traders. "The immediate cause of the Mongol invasion can be attributed to a grievous mistake of 'Alauddin Muhammad, the Shah of Khwarism. A body of traders who had arrived from Mongolia was put to death, and when Chengiz Khan deputed an embassy to enquire into the reasons for it, Muhammad replied by killing the envoy too. On receiving the news of this outrage upon international courtesy, the Mongol Khakan Chengiz Khan let loose the whirlwind of savagery upon the world of Islam." (Nadwi, 2006:49, 61-73). Muslims rulers did not foresee the effects of their...