The mental invasion and the current civilizational crisis of
the Muslims
Dr Firoz Mahboob Kamal
The civilizational issues
How the people live, how they educate their men and women, how they run states
and societies, how they frame laws and run judiciary, how they run social and
economic policies, how they build homes, villages, and cities, and how they
promote their vision, mission and identities are indeed called civilization.
Civilization is an inclusive package that gives a collective identity to a
people. It is a marker of the progress and maturity of human beings. All
civilizations are not the same and equal. Because the composite ingredients that
build civilization are not the same and equal. There exist huge qualitative
differences among civilizations. Those who worship one Almighty Allah and
receive a roadmap from Him build civilization altogether different from those
who worship cows, snakes, idols, or are secularised.
The quality of core philosophies, moral qualities of people, quality of
education, quality of culture, quality of homes and environment, quality of laws
and values, and the status of human rights are the key factors to decide the
quality of civilization. A civilization can be impregnated with the practice of
nationalism, racism, supremacism, ethnic cleansing, slavery, slave-trading,
fascism, imperialism, war of occupation, world wars, and dropping nuclear bombs
–as is the case of western civilization. The civilization that was built by the
idol-worshipping Hindus in India has its own distinctive features, too. Not only
it legitimized the division of people into different castes but also sanctioned
the burning of living widows to death with the dead husbands. The Hindu widows
were saved by an edict by the British colonial rulers. But the caste system that
made about two hundred Indians untouchables and blocked social mobility still
survives. Whereas the Islamic civilization also showed its own distinctiveness.
These are the trans-ethnic fraternity and brotherhood, the emancipation of
slaves, unrestricted social mobility, the rights of the women, survival rights
as well as religious rights for all, the rule of Divine laws, and the holy war
for enjoining the rights and eradicating the wrongs.
The birth of civilization and the Islamic perspectives
How a civilization comes to its existence is a debatable issue. The British
Professor Arnold Toynbee postulates in his famous book “A Study of History” that
civilization is the outcome of challenges and responses. Challenges work as a
stimulus to make civilization. But the question arises that challenge is not
specific to a certain group of people; it is universal. Almost every people
faced challenges, but everyone didn’t build civilization. Most people lived with
some tribal practices and then disappeared without leaving any trace of
civilization. It is also confusing when Arnold Toynbee argues that mankind’s
goal is “written largely in the constitution of human nature”. If it is true
then every man must be a civilization builder. But that didn’t happen either.
Except for a few, most people didn’t build any civilization. Many humans in
Nicobar Island still live like animals in the jungle. Arnold Toynbee also
confuses when he makes a dichotomy of humans into “pre-human ancestors” and
civilization-making human beings like ourselves. He put great men of human
history like Prophet Adam (peace be upon him) –the first man and Prophet Noah
(peace be upon him) in the category of “pre-human ancestors”. As if they were
not proper humans! Can a believer in one God –whether a Muslim, a Christian, or
a Jew accept such a demeaning view?
Although all humans live on the same planet, their intellectual, ideological,
cultural, and political worlds are not the same. They differ in the vision,
mission, and objective of survival. They differ in the philosophy of life. Hence
they build different societies, cultures, states, and civilizations. The
qualitative differences of civilizations don’t owe to skin colors, lands,
languages, race, or tribes, but to the embedded beliefs, philosophies, and
visions of life. The most common marker of the secularists is their profound
inability to see any role of Allah Sub’hana wa Ta’la in this world. So, they
keep Almighty Creator outside the domain of humans’ worldly affairs like
culture, education, laws, politics, wars, and social policies. Thus they deny
Almighty Allah any role in the creation of civilization. And they define it as
secularism.
Whereas Islam presents an altogether different world view. It is the core belief
that everything depends on the wish of Allah Sub’hana wa Tala. He is the most
decisive and the only invincible Power who can give victory even to the most
powerless and destroy the most powerful in seconds. Guiding humans is the His
sole responsibility (inna alainal huda). Every human has been given insight
vis-à-vis the right and the wrong (fal’hama’ha fujura’ha wa taqwa’ha). Whoever
He guides get the right path. And whoever disobeys His guidance goes down the
road towards deviation and hellfire. And it is the methodology of Allah Sub’hana
wa Tala that He guides people through His prophets, revelations, and holy Books.
Allah Sub’hana wa Tala plays a pivotal role in building a civilization that
provides a conducive environment for a Muslim to practice full submission to
Him. This is why the All-Wise Almighty Allah prescribes not only religious
rituals, but also gives guidance to build society, state, culture, education,
values, laws, and judiciary, and thereby a full-fledged civilization. In
building such a civilization, the Holy Qur’an works as the book of guidance. It
is the only uncorrupted Divine Book on the earth. The Holy Qur’an proved its
potential to make the most revolutionary changes in people’s beliefs, behavior,
character, culture, politics, and lifestyles. Because of Islam, Muslims could
build the best civilization on the earth the whole human history. As a result,
Islam could pull billions of people out of the path of hellfire. The moral,
cultural and behavioral quality of Muslims proved much superior to that of any
other people. Because of moral revolution, being a ruler of a state –larger than
the whole continent of Europe, Caliph Omar (RA) -while making a journey from
Medina to Jerusalem could walk with the rope of the camel in his hand while the
servant was sitting on its back. The Caliph Omar used to carry food at midnight
to poor families. And Caliph Omar (RA) was not alone with such high mortality,
thousands excelled with the same moral standard. In the whole history, no other
civilization could bring such a moral revolution.
Such distinctiveness of the Islamic civilization owes to Muslims’ philosophy of
life. Every moment of life is viewed as a Divine test that decides the fate in
the indefinite life in the hereafter. There are two ways to add to the treasure
in the hereafter: by worshiping Allah Sub’hana wa Ta’la (haqqullah) and by
serving mankind (haqqul ibad). Both are crucial. There are prescriptive ways to
worship Allah Sub’hana wa Ta’la. One can do it through learning Qur’an,
five-time prayer, month-long fasting, zakat, and hajj. There also exists
guidance to serve mankind. Giving money, building houses, delivering medical
care are good ways to serve people. But the best way to serve mankind is to
establish an Islamic state, Islamic societies, Qur’anic education, and enjoining
the right and eradicating the wrong. Only this way one can save people from
eternal life in hellfire. This is indeed a route towards making an Islamic
civilization. Hence, every true Muslim is a civilization builder. In one way or
other he or she invests his intellectual, physical, and financial capability to
establish an Islamic state and civilization. Moreover, Muslims are the only
people who are assigned to work as the Almighty’s viceroy amidst the whole
mankind –as revealed in the Holy Qur’an. Hence, the civilization they build does
not bear any racial, tribal to nationalist inclination, rather reflects the
execution of vice-regency of the Almighty Creator.
Muslims’ current civilizational failure woes to the fact that they no more work
as the viceroys of Allah Sub’hana wa Ta’la. Nor do they grow their children,
build state, and run education, culture, and judiciary as per the Qur’anic
guidance. They have abandoned to grow up with the Islamic or Muslim identities.
They work not to please Allah Sub’hana wa Tala but to promote tribal, racial,
linguistic, and national agendas. They build states, raise societies and make
institutions to serve those parochial objectives. Their philosophy, ideology,
dreams do not represent Islam. Their minds are invaded with western thoughts
that are vitriolic to Islamic beliefs. This indeed owes to the toxic effect of
long kuffar colonial rule in the Muslim World.
The colonial occupation and the catastrophic damage
The kuffar colonialists occupied not only the Muslim lands but also their minds.
The enemies occupied Muslim lands with weapons. They invaded the Muslims’ minds
by means of a corrupt colonial education system. The education system they
implemented in occupied lands is far different from the education system in
their own country. The prime objective of colonial education was to produce
mental slaves for giving sustenance to their colonial rule. Hence the graduates
of Kolkata, Punjab, Bombay, or other Indian universities were morally,
intellectually, politically, and culturally altogether different from those of
Oxford, Cambridge, and other western universities. The universities in western
countries produced patriotic scientists, researchers, philosophers, historians,
critics, and writers to serve their national interests. But the colleges and
universities of the occupied lands produced mercenaries to serve the imperialist
masters. As a result, to rule a vast country like India, the British didn’t need
to import their own people in large numbers. The native Indian mercenaries
trained in colonial colleges and universities amply did the job. Even today, the
situation hasn’t changed. The education system that the colonialists introduced
in the colonies still work with the same objectives. Hence the imperialists find
no difficulty to recruit mercenaries from the former colonies to run their
global economic and cultural empire. So, the brain drain from these colonies is
a common phenomenon.
The prime objectives of the Muslims are not to build mere mosques, madrasas, or
states. It is their obligation to raise powerful civilization to showcase Islam
to the whole of mankind –as the early Muslims did in their golden days. Only
this way they can take the message of Islam to the doorsteps of the people of
different land, language, and race. Otherwise, Islam becomes captive in the
pages of the Holy Qur’an. No healthy civilization can be built in caves and
tents. It needs to build good cities, states, societies, educational
institutions, administration, and the Army. It also needs philosophers,
thinkers, writers, preachers, researchers, reformers, warriors, and many others.
This is why a Muslim can’t confine himself in rituals, rather needs to be a
hard-core civilization builder.
Muslims’ failure
Building civilization as per the Qur’anic roadmap is itself the most important
work. It is called jihad in Islam. It is indeed the greatest ibada in Islam.
Muslims rise or fall depending on people’s participation in this great ibada. If
there is no jihad, there will be no Islamic state, no Islamic societies, no
Islamic education, no Islamic judiciary, and no Islamic civilization. It is
indeed the worst catastrophic failure that can only invite the worst disaster
like the kuffar occupation. It comes as a Divine punishment for betraying the
duty of His vice-regency. As a result of enemy occupation, the Muslims can’t
practice full Islam. Islam gets restricted only to rituals like five-time
prayers, month-long fasting, charity, and hajj. The Islamic obligations like the
Qur’anic education and the practice of sharia, hudud, shura, and jihad remain
captivated in the pages of the Holy Qur’an.
A fish needs water. Likewise, a Muslim needs an Islamic state. Hence, the
absence of an Islamic state is highly detrimental to Islam and Muslims. To avoid
such a catastrophe, Prophet Mohammad (peace be upon him) left the most important
legacy for the Muslims. It is a state-building cum civilization-building Sunnah
of the Prophet (peace be upon him). In fact, the Prophet (peace be upon him)
played the pioneering role as a state builder from day one of his migration to
Medina. Not only he built a state but also gave its laws, judiciary, and
administration ethics. He also framed education policy, foreign policy, and
political cum social policy. He built mosques, raised Army, made alliances, and
led more than a dozen war campaigns. Without such an Islamic state, one can’t
practice full Islam. It is the worst intellectual failure of the Muslims that
they failed to understand the importance of such a prophetic legacy. It is the
common problem of the Muslims that they feel high complacency in building
mosques and madrasas, but ignores Islamic state and civilization building. They
also failed badly to defend Muslim states against the kuffar invasion. Whereas,
like building an Islamic state, defending an Islamic or Muslim state is also
very crucial. This is why, as per prophetic narrative, spending few minutes
defending the border of an Islamic state is more valuable than spending a whole
night in supplementary prayers.
If Muslims fail to develop a state and its education, culture, media,
institutions around the Islamic beliefs, they fail to become true Muslims. Then
they also fail to raise an Islamic civilization. More awfully, they may not
escape extinction as a civilization force. This is indeed the most alarming
issue of Muslims today. This owes to the deep invasion of the Muslim minds by
the enemies’ manipulative and corruptive thoughts, narratives, and perspectives.
True Islamic faith does not get any space to grow in their already occupied
minds. Thus it proves that the geopolitical occupation by the enemies doesn’t
come alone. It leads to a catastrophic mental occupation.
The real threat against Muslims and Islam
Enemies' occupation of Muslims’ minds works like the real security threat
against Islam, Muslims, and the Islamic civilization. The occupation of mind
leads to cultural change, value-change, and political change. And more awfully
it leads to conceptual damage vis-à-vis foes and friends, the right and the
wrong, and the worldly life and the life after death. As a result, they lose the
moral compass. The figure of highness in their mind also gets changed. As a
result, the great Muslim heroes do not get recognized as heroes. Instead, they
take the worst enemies as the figure of highness. Even perverted thoughts and
ideologies of the enemies get followers among the Muslims. Hence in most Muslim
countries, the number of secularists, nationalists, racists, monarchists,
socialists is more than the Islamists. Such people grow up as enemies to their
own faith, own state, and own civilization. In the past, most of the damage to
the Muslim World is done by these internal enemies.
The intellectual occupation is more damaging and lasting. Hence, the satanic
forces do not work only for geopolitical occupation but for mental occupation.
They use lies and temptation to allure people towards evils. In the past, most
of the decisive wars didn’t take place in war fields but in the intellectual
premise. Now, most of the Muslim children are being conceptually killed in this
intellectual battle. Hence those who fight the war against the enemy’s
intellectual invasions are great soldiers of Islam. It is also a holy jihad. The
Holy Qur’an is the most powerful tool in this war.
The colonialists have rolled back their physical occupation, but they haven’t
ended the mental occupation. So the occupation continues. The Army, the
bureaucracy, the judiciary, and the media that were built by the enemies during
their colonial rule still work as fortified bastions for Islam’s enemies. These
mentally occupied people sabotage any civilization-building works of the
Islamists. The case of Pakistan is an example of their great success. Pakistan
–the largest Muslim country in the contemporary world was created by the Muslims
of South Asia overcoming the sectarian, geographical, and linguistic barriers.
But the whole project has been foiled by the embedded enemies that were produced
by the colonial education system. They always work as Trojan horses for the
enemies. In 2001, they worked as collaborators in the USA’s war in Afghanistan.
Even now, their eyes are on Afghanistan. They are eager to dismantle the
Islamisation project of Taleban in collaboration with the anti-Islamic coalition
of the west. The same is true for Egypt, Sudan, Algeria, Syria, Indonesia,
Bangladesh, and other former colonies. Now the true Muslims are left with no
option but to fight the internal occupation of the home-grown enemies. It is
indeed the survival issue of Islam and Muslims. 23/07/2021