1Islam - Final Episode

May peace be on you, Tip

It appears that the entire batch of ‘73 has abandoned this virtual squash court, leaving the two of us to beat each other up to submission. Actually, Razak said he posted a comment. That seems to have gone missing in cyber-limbo. Ah, never mind. I am sure many of them are in the gallery, having fun at our expense. Let’s continue the jousting:

It all depends on what you mean by “implement Islam”, Tip. The Sufis would say, “Everything, good or bad, is already Islam”. End of story.

But we are not discussing at that level. I am guessing you mean “implementation of an Islamic State that will include Islamic Law, Hudud etc”. (I said etc. because like many people, I still don’t get a full idea of what PAS means by an Islamic State.) Can’t you see that this is also another possible approach towards “peace, harmony, justice, equality etc”, all those good values that we universally uphold including Lim Guat Eng, Karpal Singh, Anwar Ibrahim and Najib Tun Razak? (At least outwardly, in any case). Even PAS doesn’t openly shout “Islamic State” nowadays, less it gets an “Over my dead body” response from Karpal Singh. And, within PAS, as you shared with us, the difference between the “Ulamas” and “Erdogans” is a question of approach, whether to cooperate with Pakatan or not. Towards what? Towards capturing Putrajaya so that you can implement all those nice things stated earlier. But does it have to include “Islamic Law”? If Karpal Singh drops dead, his son will rise in opposition and someone else after him. Besides, even if all the liquor in the country is poured down the drain, all brothels are closed and all forms of gambling (even on the golf course) are banned, would that make people more pious?

Further, where is this Islamic Law you are talking about? Is it still being drafted? Who is drafting it? How do we know that he has sufficient authority? You said before that some people are extracting “codifiable laws” from the Quran and Hadith that presumably will be the basis of this Islamic Law you have in mind. Wouldn’t this extraction process also involve translation and interpretation by humans and is susceptible to “errors”? Islamic Law means God’s Law. Do we want to attribute errors to God? Doesn’t it mean anything to you that most of the Islamic/Hudud laws that the layman is familiar with has a qualifier at the end? For example, cut the hand of a thief but not if he steals because he is hungry. Or, marry upto four but only if you can treat them all fairly. To me, this means God and the Prophet are telling us to use our heads to some extent.

For want of a better example, let’s consider the “law” on 4 witnesses. If we take this literally, no rapist will ever be prosecuted. Who will commit rape in front of 4 truthful witnesses unless they are all in collusion? No forensics can be used, not even finger prints! That being the case, wouldn’t it be understandable that an unmarried mother would just kill her baby? I can elaborate but I think you get the gist. (I could hardly believe it that Pak Ya argued that we cannot use DNA because DNA cannot be called as witnesses in the final judgment. Better not say anything more about it because what I am inclined to say is not very nice. Ahh, he’s not reading this anyway. He said so.)

I once read a book by the Iranian Nobel Prize winner, Shirin Abadi. She related that the Mullahs there extracted some holy statement from somewhere saying women who die as virgins will go to heaven. So, if a woman is sentenced to death for whatever reason, they rape her first before killing her to make sure she doesn’t go to heaven. I know this is a bit sensationalistic, to pander to Islamophobics who are her targeted audience. I am just relating it as an example how “literally taken Islamic Law” can be manipulated to perpetrate an injustice.

(REMINDER – I AM NOT AN UMNO SUPPORTER)

You asked – is the country already Islamic? Not in the sense that it has implemented Islamic law like you are suggesting. But if you look at it from the point of view of whether it is peaceful, harmonious, etc. we are doing relatively ok. Go look at the conditions in our neighboring countries in ASEAN, or even in “Islamic countries” such as Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and even Iran. We are a lot better off, if you can take it from me. Didn’t you notice the hoards of middle eastern looking people who prayed alongside us at USM? We are fast becoming a country of choice for people from the middle east to migrate to. In my neighborhood, there is one Indian Muslim family from UK who decided to move here after a single visit. There is also an American convert who decided to retire here. It’s so easy to be a practicing Muslim here, they say.

And look at ourselves. Many of us have transcended the line of poverty in just our generation. Many of us, me included, could not imagine living the lives we are living. I vividly remember talking to Ilham in section 14, PJ, before we left for UK. We just wanted 4 figure salaries and to be able to afford scrambler bikes! There is so much to be grateful for. Alhamdulillah!

You said:
The issues you listed suffer the same fate. How do you expect people who do not rule according to Islam to come out with Islamic response to such issues? Their thinking will always be influenced by unIslamic political, commercial and personal considerations.

Let’s face it. What we have in the country today is still very much the legacy of Mahathir. He once famously proclaimed Malaysia to be already an Islamic State arguing (roughly), “I am a Muslim, I try to govern Islamically. Therefore, the country is Islamic”. I can imagine him having regular imaginary conversations with the Prophet. For example, “Ya Rasulallah, some trouble makers are stirring racial sentiments in the country. What do I do?”. And the Prophet might respond (in this imaginary conversation), “Hey, you have the ISA. Just round the all up”. So we have Ops Lallang. In a nutshell, Mahathir’s problem statement can be stated as:
“Maximimize Islamicness subject to constraints:
Prevailing legal/constitutional/electoral framework
economic backwardness and mentality of the malays
Growing kurang-ajar’ness of the pendatang
etc.

There will always be constraints and the constraints change from time to time. We do not have a clean slate upon which the Islamic blueprint can be implanted.

I am not saying everything mahathir did was right but I do believe he was the best prime minister we could have had. It was as good as it can get. I know you hate him because of what he did to Anwar but imagine him asking the Prophet, “Ya Rasulallah, my IGP has reported that my designated successor is a homosexual. What do I do?” We have gone over this before. I urge you to read his memoirs. He could be lying of course but consider the plausibility of his explanation of what happened.

I am also not saying I like the present government. But we get the leadership we deserve. It’s corrupt because we (generally, not you and I) are corrupt. We take handouts from politicians without asking where they get the goodies from; we seek recompense in the form of jobs and contracts in return for our support; we put them on a pedestal and tolerate their excesses; we allow them to live beyond their official means, hardly ever asking questions; we take on contracts with kickback arrangements to them; and so on, and so on. That’s why I say if you want to change the government, you need to work on yourself first, then your family, your friends and so on. It doesn’t necessarily have to be political.

About the leadership’s thinking being influenced by “political, commercial and personal considerations”, isn’t PAS susceptible to the same stuff? Isn’t PAS’s cooperation with Pakatan and its downplaying of the Islamic State objective a political compromise to capture Putrajaya? It’s politics. Wikipedia once defined Politics as “.....about who gets what, when”. I guess they took it down because it’s too cynical. The Electoral System itself: how Islamic is it? Isn’t it susceptible to manipulation, bribery, grandstanding and everything unIslamic? Why is PAS submitting itself to something that can be said to satanic? (Overstatement, perhaps, but you get the point, I hope).

Everything that I wrote above is rendered meaningless if you are talking at the level of simple folk from my kampong: “kito oghe isle, kito keno sokong PAH (PAS) la. Kalu dok kito kape (kafir) la”. I really hope that’s not where you are coming from.

Regarding piety, of course it’s not confined to ritual matters, Tip. I am reminded of an Ayat Doc Halim sent us a few weeks ago. I can’t find it but I think it was this one:

[2:177] It is not righteousness that ye turn your faces Towards east or West, but it is righteousness- to believe in Allah and the Last Day, and the Angels, and the Book, and the Messengers; to spend of your substance, out of love for Him, for your kin, for orphans, for the needy, for the wayfarer; for those who ask; and for the ransom of slaves; to be steadfast in prayer, and practice regular charity; to fulfil the contracts which ye have made;and to be firm and patient, in pain (or suffering) and adversity, and throughout all periods of panic. Such are the people of truth, the Allah.fearing.

It says here we should fulfill the contracts we have made; elsewhere, I can recall it says we should be fair in our dealings, be kind and considerate and generally, what some people call the Golden Rule: Do unto others what you want done unto you. But I can’t recall any Quranic statement or hadith that obligates us to implement Islamic Law as I understand you mean it. Perhaps I am missing something.

I stand corrected if I implied that the teachings of the 4 Mazhabs of Sunni Muslims are confined to ritual and familial matters. What I wrote was that they appear to differ or focus on ritual and familial matters. The book “Crisis in the Muslim Mind”, among other things, asserted that due to reasons of methodology and the tension between scholars and political leaders historically, social sciences such as what we are talking about is lacking in depth of thought (my words). Anyway, I’ll look out for the book you recommended.

I do not confine myself to “intellectual” knowledge, Tip, although I must admit, I am more inclined that way. For society to progress, there has to be division of labor. Let the likes of Fuad be the Imam. As for me, I am good at other stuff. Where “transmitted” knowledge is concerned, I do know enough to get by. Give me some credit that I know how to pray, Tip.

If you hold onto what you wrote:

All the great Imams presented their interpretations and understanding of the Quran and hadith. They encouraged their students to think and make their own assessments on what they presented. They frowned upon those who follow them blindly. None of them claim theirs to be the only right way and all the others are wrong. Imam Shafie himself taught for a number of years in Syria. Later he moved on to Cairo and taught there until his death. There are a number of differences in his teachings between the two places based on new knowledge and experiences that he gathered after he moved to Cairo.

we got no issues at all! ANTICLIMAX! I have been under the impression that you believe all of us have to support PAS and if we don’t, we are wrong. Damn! We have been wasting our time. Let’s take a bow to the gallery anyway. Hand-in-hand.... If they are still there....

Wassalam