It would be observed that the countries
that are worst affected by terrorism are those whose record of human
rights abuses is bad or those who give aid to or favor the countries
using brute state power to crush freedom movement. Desperate people
burning with the desire of vengeance but having little means to fight
with the State power resort to terrorist acts. But Islam does not permit
such brutalities whatever the
cause may be and killing of innocent people is prohibited.
Islam and Infidels: Some critics of Islam quote
Quranic verses whereby Muslims are advised to
slay infidels or those who insult the Holy Prophet and
not to take Jews or Christians as friends.
Indeed by reading some of the verses in isolation or out of context one
can be mislead specially if one does not know the purpose and background
of revelation of the verses. When the Holy Prophet had started preaching
Islam he had to face stiff opposition. His own people who used to
respect him and called him trustworthy and honest man started ridiculing
him. When he did not deter they tried to bribe him and then started
threatening him and his followers. As the Islam continued to spread,
they tried to stop him with force and started beating his followers so
much so that the Holy Prophet had to migrate to Medina from Mecca.
The infidels continued to harass the Muslim by looting trade caravan or
inflicting physical harm on Muslims. When Muslim started repulsing the
attacks with force that resulted in different battles and wars. The
verses relating to those incidents and circumstances if read out of
context give quite different meaning then what can be understood when
read with the entire surah and its background..
President George W. Bush gave a long
speech to explain how the war on terrorism will be waged and that it is
not a war against Islam. But if one picks up few sentences out of
context that can
be presented as
declaration of war against Muslims.
There is a general fallacy that
Muslim women are oppressed. That used to be the case in Arabia
before Islam. Rights for women and orphans were laid down by Islam. The
policies that Taliban Government adopted in Afghanistan in regard to
women, music, dress, beard etc. stemmed out of medieval Afghan values
that existed since before conversion to Islam. The concept of veil
in Islam is to preserve modesty in such a manner that identity is not
hidden. But Afghan Burqa hides identity. Similarly the
men's Afghani dress cannot be
treated as Islamic. Islam and Women
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Islam is not a closed religion. The
need for knowledge, research, progress and Ijtehad (deliberations)has
been emphasized up on time and again. We are advised to be kind,
considerate, understanding and courteous among other things. Therefore,
to evaluate all truths and good things as Islamic or unislamic may be of
little consequence. Holy Quran goes on to the extent of saying that all
mankind is like a single nation.
Islam as a religion has its roots in
the teachings of Abraham, Moses, Isa (Jesus) and other prophets of the
God Almighty who sent Mohammed as His last Prophet with complete
guidance to establish the moral, spiritual and material values and to
show the right path and how God Almighty will surely reward us for good
deeds and/or punish for our bad deeds and deficiencies not only in
afterlife but sometimes in this world also. However, what happens to us
in this world cannot be perceived by reason. Thus the faith of a true
Muslim rarely waivers.
Generally the Weterners have a
distorted view of Islamic values. Everybody knows that the US is not
only a super power; they excel in many fields including sports, art and
literature besides science and technology. How it became the world's
most powerful nation? It is not merely because of their free economy and
vast natural resources. It is because of their constructive and
practical attitude toward work, conformity to laws and system of justice
and governance.
Generally the Westerners do not realise
that the system of governance in
the United States, as compared to most of the
other countries in the world, is closer to the
values of good governance as
laid down by Islam. The attitude of Americans
toward pursuit of knowledge, research,
their approach to human rights,
fair play and justice and various aspects of life conform
to the teachings of Islam. But
their citizens enjoy more freedom than necessary for a clean and healthy society and they
have shunned the values taught
by the Holy Prophet Isa (Jesus)
It is because the Western culture has
drifted toward materialism.its
evolution is seen by Raoul Vaneigem (b. 1934), Belgian
Situationist philosopher as: "Production and consumption are the nipples of
modern society. Thus
suckled, humanity grows in strength and beauty; rising
standard of living, all modern
conveniences, distractions of all kinds, culture for all, the comfort of your
dreams." _
E. M. Forster, British novelist points out
that materialism is not being handled
properly. "Our life on earth is,
and ought to be, material and carnal.But we have not yet learned to
manage our materialism and carnality properly; they are still entangled
with the desire for
ownership.
Materialism begets more worries,
tension, selfishness, greed and many other vices. The good
Samaritans in the West are worried over the moral decline in their
society. The values for social freedom are under constant strain due to
explosive rates of illegitimate child birth, adultery and ever rising
graphs of social and moral crimes.
Spiritualism enables the individuals to
find inner peace and happiness and draw comfort in adversity. And
Islam enables us to balance our
moral, material and spiritual values. How and why
Muslims have obscured these values and drifted from
their glorious past towards ignorance, bigotry and why some Muslim stick
to medieval traditions and why and how the moral degradation in the West
has acquired explosive rates and what will be its consequences is
another subject that will be dealt with in another article.
