Opinion
Published in Guardian Newspaper December 17, 2014.
Continued from yesterday
ASMA bint Abu Bakr (RA) relates that her mother had come from Makkah
to Madinah to meet her. Her mother was not a Muslim and followed pagan
tribal customs and beliefs. Asma enquired from the holy Prophet (SAW)
how she was supposed to treat her. The holy Prophet (SAW) told her to be
kind and considerate and to behave towards her as was a mother's due
from a daughter. Obeying one's parents and treating them with respect
and affection is a great virtue and it serves as repentance for a
person's sins. One wonders which Islamic manuscripts Dr. Cole avails
himself with to have concluded that women, black and underprivileged are
treated as second class in Islam.
More importantly, in Europe, women did not have the right to own
their own property until 19th century. When they were married, either it
would transfer to the husband or she would not be able to dispense of
it without permission of her husband. In Britain, perhaps the first
country to give women some property rights, laws were passed in the
1860's known as "Married Women Property Act". More than 1300 years
earlier, that right was clearly established in Islamic law. Again, there
is no restriction in Islamic law that says a woman cannot work nor have
a profession and that her only place is in the home. When it comes to
financial security, Islamic law is more tilted in many respects towards
women.
Indeed, these sacred codes of the Glorious Quran explain why Rowan
Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury, suggested earlier in 2008 that
aspects of Shari'ah should be adopted in Britain. The archbishop's
remarks sparked a national debate and led to calls for his resignation.
However, notable figures like Lord Phillips of Worth Matravers, the Lord
Chief Justice, strongly backed Rowan Williams. Subsequently, the
official story of adoption of aspects of Shari'ah in United Kingdom came
up in April 2014 whereby it was revealed that The Law Society - the
body which represents and advises solicitors in England and Wales -
drawn up guidance for its members on how to draw up wills in accordance
with Islamic law. A seasoned diplomat in the mould of Dr Cole is
supposed to have asked why? what? and how? about Sharia before
mis-interpreting Islamic law.
Dr. Cole labored in vain in painting Islam black with his numerous
views over the unrest in Middle East and by extension Boko Haram in
Nigeria. To start with, accusing Islam of "Takfirs" (extremists) wrong
doing is like accusing the whole generation of Christians over Adolf
Hitler's Nazism who wanted to establish "political caliphacy" across the
whole world during Second World War. Adolf Hitler was a devout Catholic
yet he was never restrained from launching attacks on other European
countries who were predominantly Christians. During this period, six
million Jews were massacred by Germans who were predominantly
Christians. The same could be said of Hiroshima and Nagasaki nuclear
bombing of several million Japanese by US military - none of whom were
Muslims. All these historical facts show that there is another dimension
to warfare beside religious theology which Dr .Cole's analysis did not
cater for.
How about the consequences of foreign policies of major world power
in relation to economic and political influence of these countries under
consideration in Middle East? Former CIA director and Secretary of
Defense, Robert Gates, confirmed in his memoir (From The Shadows) that
US backed the Mujahadin in the 1970s against former Soviet Union. The
Mujahadin later metamorphosed to Al Qaeda which wreck havoc in Middle
East today. While corroborating this line of thought, former US
Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, agreed in a report on MSNBC in 1998
that CIA gave covert support towards the formation of Al Qaeda. In
fact, US started backing Al Qaeda's forefathers even before the Soviets
invaded Afghanistan as Zbigniew Brzezinski, Jimmy Carter's National
Security Adviser, told Le Nouvel Observateur in a 1998 interview.
It is on the basis of these precarious challenges with potential for
pushing any society on the brink of lawlessness that informed his
eminence Bishop Matthew Kukah to have warned uninformed religious
leaders not to lend credence to the false belief of blame game over Boko
Haram. In the interview he granted another Newspaper on January 16,
2012 under the caption "Do not be afraid, Bishop Kukah appeals", it was
stated that Boko Haram is a national malaise that has crossed religious
barriers. The Bishop cited instances of a Christian woman who went to
her own parish Church in Bauchi and tried to set it ablaze. Again, a man
alleged to be a Christian, dressed as a Muslim, went to burn down a
Church in Bayelsa. In Plateau State, a man purported to be a Christian
was arrested while trying to bomb a Church. Armed men gunned down a
group of Christians meeting in a Church and later it turned out that
those who have been arrested and were under interrogation were in fact
not Muslims and that the story was more of an internal crisis. These and
many more including "Boko Haram" drama in Osun State by a named pastor
called for collective effort and not apportioning blame of not
"sufficiently angry". If there is a way out of these dark moments in the
history of our dear country, Dr. Cole should endeavor to offer
suggestion.
Moreover, Dr. Cole only glossed over the monumental legacy of Muslim
Arabs in pioneering modern world through science, technology and
humanity and trivialized this with overall philosophy of tolerance. It
is usually not unexpected of the writer as Sir John Glubb stated (in A
Short History of the Arab People) that "the indebtedness of Western
Christendom to Arab civilization was systematically played down, if not
completely denied. A tradition was built up, by censorship and
propaganda, that the Muslim imperialists had been mere barbarians and
that the rebirth of learning in the West derived directly from Roman and
Greek sources alone, without any Arab intervention".
No wonder HRH Prince Charles shook his large audience by surprise in a
lecture in the Sheldonian Theatre, Oxford in 1993 on Islam and The West
that "If there is much misunderstanding in the West about the nature of
Islam, there is also much ignorance about the debt our own culture and
civilization owe to the Islamic world. It is a failure, which stems, I
think, from the straight-jacket of history, which we have inherited. The
medieval Islamic world, from central Asia to the shores of the
Atlantic, was a world where scholars and men of learning flourished. But
because we have tended to see Islam as the enemy of the West, as an
alien culture, society, and system of belief, we have tended to ignore
or erase its great relevance to our own history".
Historically, this transmission of learning, culture and civilization
could not have taken place without tolerance, passion and love for
advancing humanity. For instance, the first French Pope, Pope Sylvester
II (946 - May 12, 1003) enrolled and studied at the pioneer University
of al-Karaouine in Morocco under the tutelage of Muslim Arabs. He was
credited to have introduced Arabic numerals, Abacus and Armillary Sphere
to Europe after his successful graduation. How could this have been
possible in the atmosphere of hatred and intolerance? I strongly
recommend the report of Commission on British Muslims and Islamophobia
chaired by Prof. Gordon Conway to Dr Cole in order to de-construct his
worldview on Islam and tolerance.
Paradoxically, the fabrications of non-existence evidence on the
reward of "72 virgins for Jihad" only make Islam stronger in
contemporary world. According to the Guinness Book of World Records,
Islam is the world's fastest-growing religion by number of conversions
each year. In 2007, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, the
World Christian Database has Islam as the fastest-growing religion in
the world. Again, in 2011 Gatestone Institute, a global research centre
in Europe stated that "Islam is the fastest-growing religion in England
and Wales, according to new census data that the British government says
'describes the defining characteristics of the population, who we are,
how we live and what we do'".
Surprisingly, 2014 saw the publication of the 30th Annual Status of
Global Mission in the International Bulletin of Missionary Research. In
the latest edition, the researchers estimate Islam as the fastest
growing religion in the world: 1.81% per year versus 1.53% for the 20
million Sikhs and 1.29% for Christianity.
Above all, Dr. Laura Veccia Vaglieri stated in "Apologia dell'
Islamismo" translated into English as "Interpretation of Islam" (pp.
33-34) that "Thanks to Islam, paganism in its various forms was
defeated. The concept of the universe, the practices of religion and
social customs were each liberated from all the monstrosities which had
degraded them, and human minds were made free from prejudices. Mankind
finally realized its dignity and humbled itself before the Creator, the
Lord and Master of all mankind... Man became the servant of Allah alone
and towards another free man. Each Muslim was distinguished from other
Muslims not by reason of birth or any other factor not connected with
his personality, but by his greater fear of God, his good deeds, his
morals and intellectual qualities". She also stated "It was, therefore,
neither by means of violence of arms nor through the pressure of
obtrusive missionaries that caused the great and rapid diffusion of
Islam, but above all, through the fact that this book (Qur'an) presented
by the Muslims to the vanquished, with the liberty to accept it or
reject it, was the Book of God, the Word of Truth, the greatest miracle
Mohammed could show to those in doubt and to those who remained
stubborn. The strength of this message was its crystal clear simplicity
and marvelous easiness. For Islam reached out to the soul of the people
without having recourse to long explanations or involved sermons".
- Concluded
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