Problems and Solutions

Bismillah il-'rahman il-'raheem

I realised recently that I haven’t written for over a year, which is simultaneously saddening (1) (Am I so lazy? Ought I be officially crowned Master Procrastinator?) and frightening (Was it actually more than a whole year?). (2) That did not make particularly enjoyable introspection, so of course I decided that simple avoidance was the best course of action. However, in a burst of energy, I added this to my To-Do List and because everything else on That Particular List was even more unpalatable and would have required even more unpalatable introspection, here we are again, wa lillahil-hamd :) (3)

vi  On the Qur’an as guidance  (p17)

Many people nowadays approach the Qur’an as if it is a problem to be solved, more of a hindrance in their lives, than a help. However, we don’t recognise that we cannot identify solutions from our own minds. In actual fact, the Qur’an explains what your problem is, and then helps with the solution.

In the modern era, various secular and non-secular philosophers have identified problems in society and brought forward solutions to these, take Marx or Mawdudi, for example. When a problem is identified, it is at the expense of one section of society. The solution then involves striving against that particular sector of society, and the tension between different groups remains until eventually one group is overpowered. For example, for Marx, the issue was of class conflict, the proletariat against the bourgeoisie; for Mawdudi, the issue was of political power, the Muslims against the secularists and so on. In our time, things are even worse, as sometimes completely new ‘problems’ are made up in mass media etc. People then approach the problem completely incorrectly.

We need someone outside the problem to identify the root of the problem. (4)  Many of our ‘solutions’ have added to the problems rather than helping, e.g. the recent Arab revolutions. The human mind inherently is not capable of both identifying the problem and providing the solution, though it can certainly understand once an explanation has been provided. We need external guidance. Fundamentally, we are unable to know our problem, therefore we look elsewhere for guidance. If you don’t understand this, you will not go to the Qur’an for guidance.

This is how prophets differ from ‘thinkers’. Thinkers approach problems superficially and cannot accurately identify the root of the problem, therefore the proposed solutions create even more problems. Prophets, like thinkers, also understand that there is something wrong, but they don’t impose their own thinking on to this. Prophets identify problems which are a problem for everyone, not just one group or section of society. All prophets first go to the leaders and elite of their society to clarify that their aim is not mere rebellion. They don’t seek to create tension between groups; prophets are there for all sections of society. The Prophet  Muhammad salAllahu alayhi wa sallam brought a message from God. He didn’t intend to create a political problem. The solution was the same for everyone, rich and poor. He didn’t pit one class against another, or one group against another. The problem is that you listen to Shaytan, so stop this, and turn to God. Initially, this in itself did not really seem to make sense, but it became clearer as things progressed, and the other problems were themselves solved.

The guidance that was revealed to the Prophet (s) is sufficient for all problems that people will face after him, but you need to approach the Qur’an with thirst, asking for guidance. No new solution or reform can be accurate if it does not rely on the Qur’an. If you see a Muslim thinker identify a problem, if it is not in the Qur’an, it is false. (5)

An example of this misunderstanding of the root of the problem would be during the British Raj of India. Before the creation of Pakistan, it was as if the only problem for the Muslims was that they were colonised and ruled by non-Muslims or foreigners. If this were the case, and the fundamental problem was the British and their rule, why do the children of these same people now want to come to the UK to be ruled by the British? The problem is being ruled by people who are following their desires, irrespective of where they are from.

وَالَّذِينَ يُؤْمِنُونَ بِمَا أُنزِلَ إِلَيْكَ وَمَا أُنزِلَ مِن قَبْلِكَ وَبِالآخِرَةِ هُمْ يُوقِنُونَ

بِمَا أُنزِلَ إِلَيْكَ    refers to everything that was revealed to the Prophet (s) during his life, and is also a clear indication that there will no further external guidance, as if there were, this would be more important to mention here than the reference to earlier scriptures that follows.

The earlier scriptures are mentioned for two reasons:

1 -   They indicate that this is a human problem: it has always been that humans have required external guidance. E.g. Adam was commanded to follow the guidance 2:38 (6)

2 -   It indicates that what is important is not who has received the guidance, but that the guidance is from God. You need to follow the guidance, not the person. The Qur’an is centred around God, not around a particular person. The Bible contains human influence, and it is clear that there are parts that centre around the superiority of particular people or families as ‘Chosen People’ (7). In the Qur’an however, most of the references are to other prophets, not even the Prophet Muhammad (s) himself. In fact, the Prophet (s) is told to clarify that he is not the first of the Messengers, 46:9 (8).  The message revealed by God to each prophet was complete. (9)

The Qur’an seeks unity of the believers: 2:285, لاَ نُفَرِّقُ بَيْنَ أَحَدٍ مِّن رُّسُلِهِ The Qur’an wants to bring the people of all the scriptures together. However, they cannot just follow the earlier scriptures as they cannot be sure what has been corrupted later by the people, or abrogated. Therefore, we believe in what was revealed to all prophets, but must believe in the Qur’an as the final complete guidance. Unfortunately however, although with the Qur’an, Muslims cannot make up or change the text itself, they can change the meaning, and this is what they do. They are no different from the followers of the earlier scriptures in this regard.

وَالَّذِينَ يُؤْمِنُونَ بِمَا أُنزِلَ إِلَيْكَ وَمَا أُنزِلَ مِن قَبْلِكَ  Why is ‘ma’ repeated here?

This is not to differentiate between two groups of people, but rather, between two different things. The people are the same الَّذِينَ mentioned once. The two things they believed in, the Qur’an and earlier scripture, are different. However, those who believed in the Torah when it was revealed are as good believers as those who believed in the Qur’an. The actual message is the same, though the language, order and sequence etc. may contain some differences.

The real problem for human beings is that we were created to love and worship God. If you do not do this, the soul remains empty. Money will not solve this problem. Giving a mother who has lost her child a statue of his likeness will not satisfy her, even if the statue is made of gold. Looking for everything in the life of this world will inevitably result in failure. There is a Hereafter to come for everything else. Problems are an inevitable part of this life. Searching for absolute happiness here is searching in the wrong place. Therefore, the believers are those who بِالآخِرَةِ هُمْ يُوقِنُونَ. Suffering will come in this life; be patient. Adam was told فَقُلْنَا يَا آدَمُ إِنَّ هَذَا عَدُوٌّ لَّكَ وَلِزَوْجِكَ فَلا يُخْرِجَنَّكُمَا مِنَ الْجَنَّةِ فَتَشْقَى (20:117). Nobody can change the way of the world. Even the prophets were commanded to be patient with regards to their problems, not to seek peace and happiness in this life. The believers keep their focus on the Hereafter. Then they will say, الْحَمْدُ لِلَّهِ الَّذِي أَذْهَبَ عَنَّا الْحَزَنَ إِنَّ رَبَّنَا لَغَفُورٌ شَكُورٌ (35:34). Muslim movements in our time focus on this world and its problems, contrary to the way of the prophets. The prophets taught, فَمَن زُحْزِحَ عَنِ النَّارِ وَأُدْخِلَ الْجَنَّةَ فَقَدْ فَازَ (3:185). The biggest problem for human beings is the Fire – that is what you need to escape. Yet you cannot understand that from your own mind, because you do not know the Hereafter.  

Toenotes:

(1) I was going to say ‘depressing’, but I’ve been trying not to use the word because my mum is on a clinomorphism-eradication campaign where nobody is allowed to say they’re feeling depressed or describe someone as OCD. I don’t stoop to the latter of course (how could I, when my actual livelihood itself depends on maintaining that fiction of superiority that allows me to control words, and by extension, lives even), but I am really not sure I agree with depression being included in that, because it’s actually a word pre-medical colonisation, and what about economic depression? (I imagine an old man [why not woman? {that is my internalised misogyny :p}] who is The Economy sitting hunched on a wooden chair until we inject his veins with lots of gold or give him some ECT and he perks up). Anyway, discussing the finer details of such things in the X household is rarely helpful, because we (by which I mean I) always inevitably return to the silly Pakistani third person sing/pl thing. partly because the stupidity of it annoys me so much that it’s always lingering somewhere in my background of my mind, ready to pop up its irritating little head, and partly because I could never concede that someone who truly believes they can project one language into another is actually a rational human being (even if that is essentially an excommunication of all Anglophone Pakistanis from the human race [does that makes me worse than an Evil Takfiri?]). Anyway, this exact situation occurred last week after Sibling 3 was rebuked for describing someone as ‘so OCD’. In my infinite wisdom, I decided that was the opportune moment to enlighten The Family that anyone who felt it appropriate to arbitrarily pluck out grammatical rules from one language and impose them on another in the interests of misplaced sentiments of respect, was unlikely to be best placed to offer suggestions on minor vocabularic infractions, and it might be preferred if they desisted (Perhaps that’s not exactly how I phrased it). Then everyone told me to Shut Up because I’d spoiled The Reunion and it (allegedly) wasn’t important and some spiritual blackmail of the variety of being dutiful to one’s parents (though what that has to do with Anything, I can’t fathom) was used to silence me on this subject (not forever, though I suppose it was an unwanted proposal of sorts).

(2)   I’m not even exaggerating when I say it’s frightening. There is probably something here (nothing to do with this at all) about distorted time perception as a denial of reality, serving as a defence against the pain of the now looming separation and loss (where I am initiated into The World of Grown Ups, or at least leave The World of Junior Whatevers [and so will reside in some kind of manzila bayn al-manzilatayn for a bit. It doesn’t do to think too hard about Mu’tazili theology, but I can’t figure out which ought to be heaven and which hell, or whether the whole thing is some awful Underworld with some places of Minimally-Reduced-Awfulness {Come to think of it, Hunt sounds very similar to Hades, or certainly there is one common letter, which is good enough for me. Indeed, I might even paraphrase Agamemnon here: It is only Hunt who is utterly ruthless and unyielding—and hence he is of all Tories the one most hateful to doctors and mankind. Iliad, Book IX}]).  

(3)   S, I think this requires a return to the roots and some mithai?

(4)   I’ve just been reading a really interesting book called The Unconscious at Work: Individual and Organizational Stress in the Human Services, eds Vega Zagier Roberts and Anton Obholzer. It’s about psychoanalysts from the Tavistock consulting to institutions about various problems they are facing, and some of the case studies are fascinating, and just reminded me exactly of this, the link being needing someone outside to identify the root of the problem.

       (5)   Lest this be misunderstood, we are talking about problems as the fundamental problem of the human condition which then defines your worldview, not smaller ‘problems’ that are faced as part of life. For example, is the fundamental problem that there are different classes of people in conflict with each other, those who produce against those who own the means of production? Or is it that the believers as a community (outside of individual relationships with God) do not have sufficient political power to control the environment they live in? [5a] Or is it that fundamentally there is no equality between men and women, and women must achieve a position equivalent to that of men in the first instance? The issue here is not whether there is any truth at all to such arguments, but whether it is this that is the fundamental problem. As these problems are not specifically identified in the Qur’an, they cannot, by definition (for a muslim!), be applicable to the whole of humanity, and as such, could not be the fundamental problem.

[5a] From sh A: With regards to ‘political Islam’, it could be said that its thinkers did use the Qur’an as a source to find solutions. However, there are two issues here: firstly, to turn to God in order to identify the problem, and then secondly, to find the solution through the Qur’an and sunnah.  These people identified the problem in the context of their own society and their understanding thereof, and then turned to the Qur’an for a solution. However, lacking a state or political power was never the fundamental problem. Uthman rd was martyred during the reign of the khilafah. Political power will not solve the fundamental problem.

      (6)   Al-Baqarah: 38 قُلْنَا اهْبِطُواْ مِنْهَا جَمِيعًا فَإِمَّا يَأْتِيَنَّكُم مِّنِّي هُدًى فَمَن تَبِعَ هُدَايَ فَلاَ خَوْفٌ عَلَيْهِمْ وَلاَ هُمْ يَحْزَنُونَ

      (7)   This is one of the key themes of this surah, that simply belonging to a group, be it the Children of Israel, or the Muslims, or anything else, is irrelevant to God, and not sufficient for salvation. This is really important and will be addressed separately at some point.

  

      (8)   Al-Ahqaf: 9 قُلۡ مَا كُنۡتُ بِدۡعًا مِّنَ الرُّسُلِ وَمَاۤ اَدۡرِىۡ مَا يُفۡعَلُ بِىۡ وَلَا بِكُمۡؕ اِنۡ اَتَّبِعُ اِلَّا مَا يُوۡحٰٓى اِلَىَّ وَمَاۤ اَنَا اِلَّا نَذِيۡرٌ مُّبِيۡنٌ

(9)   From sh A: It was not that the Prophet (s) came and completed their guidance. This is a misunderstanding of 5:3 الْيَوْمَ أَكْمَلْتُ لَكُمْ دِينَكُمْ وَأَتْمَمْتُ عَلَيْكُمْ نِعْمَتِي وَرَضِيتُ لَكُمُ الإِسْلامَ دِينًا   which refers to the Prophet’s (s) own guidance was it was revealed in stages, and was made complete with Hajj. Each messenger was in fact given a complete message, which was then corrupted by the people. The hadith regarding the Prophet (s) being the final brick does not refer to the message of earlier prophets being incomplete, but that no further message will come and there will be no further alteration or change to the message.