‘FAMILY OF THE HEART’ SEMINAR ON ISLAM

Religon, Human and 21st century

By Dr. Tahir M. Qazi

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Reviewed by Masud Sheikh, November 2003

I will start off by commenting on something that appears fairly early in Dr. Tahir Qazi’s article. Dr. Qazi says that love must have been the basis of the earliest laws made for primitive societies or tribes. He then goes on to say ‘the first law must have failed….Thus the concept of good and evil came into being’.

I would like to talk about the concept of good and evil. I believe that ‘good’ and ‘evil’ are largely relative concepts. To explain my point of view, I will talk about two fundamental drives among humans. One of these drives is based around love. The other drive is based on the survival instinct. Quite often, what is seen as evil is based on the drive to survive. Of the two drives, the drive to survive is more primitive, and is present in almost all living creatures. This drive allows the preservation of species. As living creatures move up the evolutionary ladder, their nervous systems - and hence their thoughts and feelings - get more developed. In the higher animals, this drive to survive, in addition to preservation of species, leads to conservation of traditions, values and norms.

The second set of drives - the capacity to love and to learn - is only present in higher animals. What one loves and learns depends on the influences one has from early childhood. Our experiences develop feelings of love and loyalty to tribes or communities. So the world in which we humans exist, and which we shape, is brought forth through our interactions and relationships. We are changed by every deep experience, even though at times the changes are not wholly visible.

To illustrate how experience shapes us, I will relate the story of two girls who were rescued from a family of wolves in India in 1922. I have taken this story from a very interesting book named “The Tree of Knowledge” written by Humberto Maturana and Francisco Varela. My ideas about the drives of survival and of love are also derived from my understanding of this book.

But to get back to the story of the two rescued girls: These girls did not walk on two feet, but moved rapidly on all fours. They did not speak and had inexpressive faces. They ate only raw meat, rejected human contact and preferred the company of wolves. Their separation from the wolf family caused a profound depression and brought them to the brink of death. The younger of the two girls was five when she was found, and she died soon afterwards.

The older one, who was eight, survived another ten years. She learned to walk on two feet, although she would go back to running on four feet under the stress of urgency. Many persons, who came to know her closely, never felt that she was completely human.

The above story vividly illustrates that many behaviors we consider innate to human beings, are in fact not innate, but learned. This learned behavior includes walking on two feet. The behaviors of a culture, society, or tribe may seem outlandish and evil to other societies. Even though these behaviors appear evil to other societies, they are solidly grounded in shared experiences of education, history, culture, religion, nationality, and ways of organizing and governing.

Imagine that instead of only two girls, a whole tribe of people had been brought up among wolves. Imagine also that another tribe had been brought up by lambs. Without a language that can be used to communicate, and with reflexive behaviors that were learned since childhood, the tribe of people who grew up with lambs would be mortally afraid of the tribe that grew up with wolves.

If the gaps between two sets of people are too large, if there is little or no common ground of shared experiences and values, then the differences can lead to denial of ‘Others’, and perhaps to killing ‘Them’ so that ‘We’ can survive.

In recent centuries, traditional tribes have largely disappeared. They have been replaced by what may be called ‘communities’. Communities have some things in common, and can easily communicate about what they have in common. So for instance, Canadians have common interests, Muslims have common interests, Christians have common interests. And while Muslims and Christians have some things that differentiate them, there are many things in common between them. There can also be communities of work interests - for instance of business owners, or of craftsmen.

All these communities – of religion, nationality, culture, and other groupings of humans, can unite or divide people. Historically, perhaps the greatest divider has been nationalism. Religion, on the other hand has both divided as well as united tribes. We often hear how Prophet Muhammad united many tribes with the revelation of Islam. Islam as a uniting force has extended beyond national boundaries, and to that extent has served as a counter force to some of the evils of nationalism, some forms of which can become primitive tribalism.

Islam understands and caters to the human drives of learning and love on the one hand, and of preservation and survival on the other. Where the drive to preserve and survive dominates, Muslims become sectarian, and tend to look at smaller groupings within the religion, to which they owe their loyalties.

When the drive to love and learn transcends the drive to survive, Muslims see the spirit behind the religion, and find that not only do all Muslims have a lot in common, but all of humanity has a lot in common. So, for instance the message of love that comes from Muslim Sufi teachers like Rumi.

I find it interesting that Sufistic interpretations of Islam have thrived in places where Islam has interacted with other religions. In South Asia, the Sufis interacted with Hindus and Buddhists. In Iran, Sufis interacted with Zoroastrians or Parsees. In Turkey, Sufis interacted with Christians, and perhaps with Jews. These interactions played a large part in Muslim spiritual traditions. When interaction with other religious traditions is absent, understanding and good communication becomes difficult.

Similarly, mutual understanding becomes extremely difficult when tribes have large gaps in customs, rituals and ways of behavior. Where the need to survive overcomes the need to love, conflict occurs, which can become destructive. Where the drive to love dominates, there is harmony and a spirit of co-existence and mutual learning.

When we let the higher drives to love and to learn be the basis of our consciousness, we see the interconnections that John Donne talked about when he said “No man is an island entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main. If a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as well as if a manor of thy friend's or of thine own were: any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind, and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee”

Getting back to Dr. Qazi’s article, I would now refer you towards the end, where he says “So many religions with so many messages of human wellbeing are, as a matter of fact, a testament to the failure of religious approach. They have been divisive as a whole” and a little later he says “Human beings need a higher ideal for the sake of inspiration and motivation to abide by those laws. Human does not need any new law but he does need a new spirit”.

I have already said that nationalism has been far more divisive than religion. Yet, we do not yet see any prospect of nation states being dismantled. Similarly, I do not see individual religions going away.

Rather than wait for the ‘higher ideal’ to which Dr. Qazi refers, I suggest we fill the spiritual void from within existing religions and ideals. Sufism is a prime example of the spirituality I talk about. Spiritual ideals also exist within humanistic laws. Canada, with its Charter of Rights and Freedoms, is an excellent example of such laws. Interestingly, both Canada’s Charter and the American Declaration of Independence recognize the supremacy of God.

Dr. Qazi’s ends his article by saying “Survival of human species thus far is proof of its vitality, which appears to me like a ray of hope and sufficient reason to believe in an optimistic future”.

I hope Dr. Qazi is right to hope for an optimistic future, but I would like to move beyond hoping. I would like to see us working towards this optimistic future. I believe that the conflict between the drive to survive and the drive to love is the basis of many problems today. We can overcome these problems if our drive to love transcends our drive to survive.

To illustrate my point, I would like to refer to the famous article by Samuel Huntington “The Clash of Civilizations”. Towards the end of his article, Huntington says “a central focus of conflict for the immediate future will be between the West and several Islamic-Confucian states”.

He then goes on to give short-term and long-term implications of his hypothesis. Here are some recommendations he makes for the short-term: “to exploit differences and conflicts among Confucian and Islamic states; to support in other civilizations groups sympathetic to Western values and interests”.

For the longer term, in addition to other recommendations he makes, he says that the West will need “to develop more profound understanding of basic religious and philosophical assumptions underlying other civilizations……” and “…to identify elements of commonality between Western and other civilizations”

If we look at current policies of the United States, it is clear that the US is working on Huntington’s short-term recommendations, where the need to survive and dominate overcomes the need to love and to learn.

In making his recommendations, I am concerned that Huntington does not consider how short-term goals can spiral out of control, and how difficult it can be to switch from short-term to long-term. Huntington seems to have a mechanical view of the world, where humans can operate as machines, and can switch from a manipulative short-term mindset to a meaningful long-term mindset. What is more likely is that experiences of the short-term strategy will start shaping the long term approach, and build mindsets that will focus on tribal survival rather than inclusive co-existence.

For people who truly accept the view that love can overcome fear, I believe the only option is to work for the long-term, which means reaching out to others, enhancing understanding and love, and accepting that we create our future by the actions we take today. Particularly for minorities in the West, that is not only the moral option, but also the only sensible option.

To summarize, I am saying that I believe religions, definitely including Islam, can be a force for unity, and this unity can extend beyond individual religions and nations to the whole of humanity. Equally, humane national laws can serve a similar purpose. To move towards this unity, we need to focus on spirituality rather than dogma, and on the human drive to love rather than the drive to survive.

I would like to end with a quote from THE TREE OF KNOWLEDGE, which says “We have only the world that we can bring forth with others, and only love helps bring it forth”

1. THE TREE OF KNOWLEDGE by Humberto R. Maturana & Francisco J. Varela. Published by SHAMBHALA (Boston and London)

2. “THE CLASH OF CIVILIZATIONS?” ASIAN RESPONSES edited by Salim Rashid. Published by The University Press Ltd. Dhaka, Bangladesh

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