Ideological Confusion - نظریاتی اور فکری کنفیوژن اور ممکنہ حل

"ہم ایک ایسے اسلامی تصور کا تعاقب کر رہے ہیں جو انسانیت، جمالیات، دانش اور روحانی عقیدت سے خالی ہے … جس کا تعلق طاقت سے ہے نہ کہ روح سے، عوام کو  حصول اقتدار کے لیے متحرک کیا جاتا ہے نا کہ ان کی مشکلات کے خاتمے اور تمناؤں کے حصول کے لیے." (اقبال احمد)

“We are chasing an Islamic order ‘stripped of its humanism, aesthetics, intellectual quests and spiritual devotions…. concerned with power not with the soul, with the mobilization of people for political purposes rather than with sharing and alleviating their sufferings and aspirations.”[Eqbal Ahmad]

What Confucius taught us

When a society passes through critical crises, alternative systems emerge to tackle the situation. Reformers try to repair the broken system and make it functional again. On the other hand, revolutionaries and radicals want to completely abolish old institutions and replace them with new ones that are based on their ideology.

After developing an understanding of the society and its problems, philosophers, thinkers and intellectuals present ideas and thoughts to change the social fabric. The role of philosophers became crucial and effective in Chinese history whenever the society faced political, social and economic difficulties.

The famous philosopher who presented innovative ideas to control the crises and to transform the society was Confucius, who was born in 551BC at Lu (Northern China). After completing his education, he wandered from one state to another in search of employment as he wanted to implement his ideas through state authority. But he failed to get a job and returned home disappointed.

We love Chinese food and culture, how about some Chinese philosophy?
Later, when he became a teacher, he attracted students and disciples who were eager to learn his brand of philosophy. He established an academy, which was an innovation because there was no such educational institution in China at the time. Previously, education was a privilege only for children from the nobility, but his academy was open to the rich and poor alike. This showed his belief in social equality. He introduced a curriculum which included poetry, history, politics, music and sports with the objective of producing educated and well-rounded people for a model society.

Confucius, like Socrates, did not write anything but verbally transmitted his knowledge to his students. Later, his disciples collected his sayings in the form of a book entitled Annalex. Through this book, we can study the philosophy and ideology of Confucius which emphasises the creation of a class of morally and ethically sound bureaucrats. He believed that the three qualities imperative for government officials were kindness, courtesy and compassion.

He wanted them to be appointed on the basis of their intelligence and merit, and not by right of birth or because they belonged to a privileged family. Thirdly, he believed that they should have the determination and courage to implement law and order, and perform their duties without any fear of higher authorities. Candidates appearing in the examination for bureaucracy or civil service had to learn and memorise the ideas and teachings of Confucius as part of the curriculum.

Confucius also laid stress on maintaining the hierarchical order of the society. In a family, children should obey their parents and look after them in their old age. Since there was no system of social security for the elderly, this ensured that the family would be morally bound to take care of their elderly parents and grandparents.

He highlighted ancestry and the importance of linking the past to the present. He wanted people to obey their superiors and ultimately the ruler. Successive Chinese ruling dynasties adopted the philosophy of Confucius to control social and political problems and to establish their domination.

Is the philosophy or ideas of Confucius relevant today or not? In Pakistan, moral and ethical values have declined and thus corruption, lawlessness, disorder and anarchy have been unleashed. There is increased unemployment leading to an increased crime rate. The bureaucracy trained and educated on principles of colonialism is inefficient and corrupt, arrogant, rude and anti-people.

The society needs to learn moral values as a solution to these problems. Confucius’ philosophy is not based on any religious or spiritual authority but purely on a secular concept of meritocracy. Perhaps our society requires such moral and ethical values to restore honesty, piety, dignity and compassion.

Past present: What Confucius taught us
by Mubarak Ali, dawn.com

Intellectual blockage

Ideas are an integral part of a society. They enable human beings to tackle the challenges of time and accommodate differences within a social whole. At the social level ideas and their materialisation in the form of institutions and norms help societies understand change and make new social arrangements accordingly. At different points in history, societies face situations where a problem becomes insoluble through the available conceptual assemblage of the prevalent paradigm. In philosophy this problem is called ‘aporia,’ which can be translated in simple English as impasse, obstacle or blockage.

The intellectual landscape in Pakistan has all the telltale signs of intellectual aporia. Today Pakistan is facing an existential threat because of various internal and external factors. Such a situation demands introspection in its society. However, the prevalent ideas of Islamism and secularism have failed to provide an alternative vision. In the war of ideas, the intelligentsia of both secular and religious persuasions stay in their ideological trenches and stick to their ideological guns. Therefore, no dialogue takes place between the two and discussions taking place within the respective schools of thought are monologues.

The failure of our minds to take us out of the current morass is the result of an intellectual blockage in Pakistani society. This blockage creates immense existential tension within the society. The killing of innocent people across the country is just a tip of the iceberg. The malaise within the social body can be diagnosed, and can even be cured, if the blockage in thinking is removed. Despite the gravity of the situation, the secular and religious minds are not prepared to break the boundaries of their dogmatic enclosures because they fear they will become irrelevant if the configuration of ideas is changed.

Ironically, it is the intellectual blockage that provides an opportunity to iconoclasts to break the status quo and paves the way for an alternative society. In his book Time for Revolution, Antonio Negri writes: “...after blockage, there is an epoch. And it is within this epoch that we must move and consciously construct the new temporality. The tension of the blockage is broken and reveals the force blockage held back.”

The intellectual blockage in Pakistan can be broken by every aspect of self, society and state being questioned anew. Only after the blockage is broken can we open new avenues and come up with imaginative answers. Another element contributing to the intellectual stagnation in Pakistan is the lack of radical questioning in our society. What is missing in the post-9/11 intellectual discourse in Pakistan is criticism of secularism from within. Our secular class has adopted the global vogue of religion being used as a scapegoat for everything evil on earth. Secularists uncritically accept whatever is available in the supermarket of ideas. It is important to criticise the version of religion we follow, but by solely focusing on this single factor, we miss the bigger picture: that various socio-psychological, political and economic factors intersect to form a new reality and consciousness, of which religion is a part.

For change to occur in Pakistani society, a critique of both religious and secular reason is indispensible. It is wrong to assume that secularism and religion are mutually exclusive. Rather, in the ideological battle in Pakistan, secular and religious forces derive their reason of existence from the very presence of the other force, because, in existing in the same time and space, they reinforce each other. Secularists tend to essentialise modern religious forces by attributing an immutable essence to them. However, the reality is that Islamism is as much a product of modernity as modern seculars are. On the other hand, religious ideologues wrongly equate secularism with atheism.

Although it is important for secular discourse to address the issue of religion in modern times, it should not make religion its obsession. The existing economic and political structure of the world is here to stay as a powerful factor affecting our lives today. It is social and economic transformations that are determining modern contours of religion, and not vice versa. For instance, Islam did not create cyberspace, but cyberspace has definitely created what can be described as a cyber-ummah. Religion is not strong enough to withstand the onslaught of modernity in the long run. It will eventually adopt, or co-opt into, modern systems, albeit not in their pure forms.

Second, the aporia is caused by knowledge being made subservient to the interests of power. In our media-dominated world, the discourse generated by power is internalised by people because of the media. As a result we tend to see and define everything through the vocabulary concocted by those with the power to manufacture consent. Once we imbibe this vocabulary as normative indicators in our discourse, we tend to reject alternative voices and their narratives. To overcome the intellectual crisis in Pakistan, religious and secular scholars have to heed each other in order to move beyond the self-righteous frame of mind and binary thinking.

We come to an intellectual impasse when we try to preach to the converted, and refuse to listen to the ‘infidels’. We can understand the ‘other’ and our own existential situation when we derive language from our existential experience. War on the military front can be fought with borrowed weapons, but the war of ideas can only be won through rational exchange of ideas within Pakistani society.

Aziz Ali Dad: A freelance columnist based in Islamabad. Email: azizalidad@gmail.com

http://www.thenews.com.pk/Todays-News-9-158957-Intellectual-blockage

<<Free-eBooks Click here>>> 

Importance of intellectual;s Voice

Religious intolerance, extremism, warmongering and violence in the name of religion and trampling of human rights reign, while the rich and the ruling have abandoned the people and their problems. Sadly, there are no towering figures as Voltaire to raise a voice against these vices and transform society like he had done in the 18th century Europe.

Intellectuals have always played a crucial role in society. These are people who are not concerned with the popularity of their views nor do they follow popular trends. On the contrary, they write and speak what they believe in and what is intended for the betterment of society. When intellectuals raise their voice against prevalent ideas, they are criticised and condemned but they continue their struggle relentlessly however controversial it may be. Voltaire, the French intellectual, was the champion of enlightenment and throughout his life he struggled for freedom of expression and human dignity and was against religious extremism and intolerance. He was a prolific writer and wrote over a hundred books, pamphlets and tracts.

He corresponded with European rulers, members of the aristocracy, other intellectuals as well as ordinary citizens, and wrote around 25,000 letters discussing political and religious issues. Eventually he was banished from Paris. Voltaire wandered from one place to the other for refuge but never compromised on his ideas despite suffering in exile. He settled down in an estate which he purchased on the border of France and Switzerland where people from all walks of life visited him.

Voltaire was born in an age of religious extremism when in Catholic France, there was no tolerance for protestants. On April 13, 1598 in Nantes, the French King, Henri IV (and Prince of Navarre), formally signed the document known as the Edict of Nantes. Even though the edict did not put an end to the pogroms and the persecutions, whose victims were Protestant believers in France, it did terminate what became known as the Wars of Religion, while legally (for a time at least) fixing the status of these reformers in the kingdom. It is to Nantes glory to have associated its name with one of the most far reaching acts of religious tolerance in history.

August 24, 1572 was the date of the infamous St Bartholomew’s Day Massacre in France. On that day, over 400 years ago, began one of the most horrifying holocausts in history. The glorious Reformation, begun in Germany on October 31, 1517, had spread to France—and was joyfully received. A great change had come over the people as industry and learning began to flourish, and so rapidly did it spread that over a third of the population embraced the Reformed Christian Faith.

Voltaire favoured religious pluralism and believed that one religion or faith could make the society fanatic and narrow-minded. With two religions, people would slaughter each other in the name of faith. Only a society which had multiple religions would be tolerant and understanding of one another’s faith. In his writings, he emphasised on tolerance and condemned St Augustine and Thomas Aquinas, who had preached intolerance against non Christians.

Voltaire criticised the clergy when the church opposed inoculation against small pox, claiming it to be an intervention against the work of God. He supported inoculation and accused the priests of being superstitious. When there was an earthquake in Lisbon in which thousands of people died, the clergy called it divine punishment for the sinners but regarded it a blessing for the good people who died and earned paradise by the grace of God.

Voltaire opposed their views as he believed the earthquake to be a natural calamity.

Voltaire not only influenced the European society but also impressed the rulers by his views. He was invited by Frederick II of Prussia where he lived for three years but left in disappointment when he realised that he was only considered a decoration in the court and the implementation of his philosophy was not intended.

However, he continued to correspond with Frederick and discouraged him against wars in Europe, describing gruesome details of the battlefield where thousands of men died just to glorify kings and killers. He wrote letters to Catherine of Russia advising her to abolish serfdom and liberate the peasants. He vehemently opposed the French aristocracy who consumed wealth and made no contribution to society.

He remained anti-clergy throughout his life and argued that it was the priests and the religious people who created conflict, bloodshed and hatred in society while Hobbes, Locke, Newton, and Spinoza peacefully benefited humanity through their ideas and inventions.

In 1778, his 84th year, Voltaire attended the first performance of his tragedy Irène, in Paris. His journey and reception were a triumph, but the emotion was too much for him to handle, and he died in Paris soon afterwards. His body later on was transferred to the Pantheon which was built by the revolutionary government to honour its heroes.

Pakistani society is presently going through a similar process that France and Europe went through in the 18th century.
Religious intolerance, extremism, warmongering and violence in the name of religion and trampling of human rights reign, while the rich and the ruling have abandoned the people and their problems. Sadly, there are no towering figures as Voltaire to raise a voice against these vices and transform society like he had done in the 18th century Europe.
http://www.dawn.com/2011/12/18/past-present-the-intellectual-voice.html

Please visit: http://aftabkhan.blog.com

Islam: the Dynamic Way of Life - Urdu

http://e.jang.com.pk/12-09-2011/Lahore/images/05_01.gif

Must also read:

1. Science & Eduction
2. Islam & Society

Please visit: http://aftabkhan.blog.com