| May 30, 2003 | Friday | Rabi-ul-Awwal 27,1424 |
Harbinger of a new order
THE mission of Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) is indeed unique as he is a role model to his followers. The Prophet was able to mould the character of his fellowmen, reform them, change their thoughts, put new ideals before them and elevate them to a higher plane of a better and peaceful life.
Mynas, uncouth rustics who have no manners, nor any taste for Munir Niazi’s sad verses, cackled noisily. A cuckoo, elusive as ever, flew in surreptitiously into the dark woods flanking the laid back terrace of the Jacaranda estate where the old bard was being hosted on last weekend’s mildly breezy evening. Its full- throated dirge for another day lost to time drowned the poet’s own lamentations for bygone evenings that we were straining to hear. The light wind carried away his words.
Mercifully much of the best of Munir is easily memorisable. The audience prompted him to read the next line as the verses reverberated in the mind. There was much nodding of the heads and much sighing because Munir’s verse talks; it says things you can identify with. Kishwar Nahid who had laid out the setting for the open-air soiree with her cottage art informality sat next to Munir. Indulgence itself. A heap of flowers brought by guests lay at his feet. One lady choked his husky throat with wreaths of marigolds. Their pungent scent the crazy May wind blew away. Niazi, it was nice to notice, had little interest in the familiar things being said about him.
Wrong questions, Munir complained, were framed to secure his indictment. He became a poet for life. Did nothing else. Pathans are dynamic people, relentless in their pursuits. They have a cerebral purity that makes it easy for them to be single-minded. They see things more clearly than a lot of us. They go on long journeys to return to their rocky arid villages unspoilt. Fast learners, they refuse to be taught. Munir is an aberrant Niazi. He entered a confusion to map its roads and has remained lost in its myriad lanes. Ennui, which is alien to Pathans, is his poetry’s central sentiment. It is not just lack of interest, or a severe form of boredom. It is a rejection, emptying of the soul, an aching passionlessness. Munir, therefore, has as much to blame himself as the cruel city. He roams its circular streets without any thought of returning. Lost in the maze, he becomes a borrowed thought plaguing another mind. He annihilates himself and the thought makes him tearful. He sobs seeing so many admirers joining to mourn a loss that he himself has no clue about. This open-ended suggestiveness of his verse and the possibilities it alludes to tickles the fancy.
Urbane in his white Rampuri kurta-pyjama, Hashim Babar, owner of the Jacaranda estate, and a poet to boot, who was hosting Munir’s recital for the Shah Hussein Academy as an inaugural meet for the new addition to his guest house chain, saw a Sufi connection in Munir’s Punjabi poetry. Now to be honest this Sufi thing has so been loosened and widened out of shape since the late seventies and particularly since a Pop band’s criminal assault on it that its very mention makes one immediately suspicious. Munir is a very human person, full on the erring side. That’s why he makes such divine poetry. His spirituality, if any, is entirely corporeal, terrestrial indeed. And that, I suppose, makes for the aberration.
The cuckoo that sang through the evening its supposedly sweet refrain is, in fact, a very feudal bird. Its call is an affirmation of its territorial rights. No other of its kind can lay claim to the area of its influence. And in this area it freely uses nests made by other birds to hatch its own brood of winged chaudhries. And yet there’s hardly a poet who may not have romanticized this atrocious usurper. Then it seems to have a malicious purpose in keeping itself hidden deep in the woods. It has no love for flowers. What it needs is a good cover.
Now a word about the jacaranda tree. It is a tropical tree of America, which blossoms in summer for a few weeks. I never saw it in Rawalpindi but in Islamabad you see it in nearly every sector. When in bloom bunch behind bunch of its blue bell-shaped flowers hang down in abundant profusion and perfume the nights with their delicate scent. The azure hues change into mauve as the evening approaches, taking a darker shade as night deepens. Morning brings lighter vicissitudes of colour to match the varying intensity of the sun. The lightest breeze seems to fancy the tender touch of their silken bodies; in their thousands they lie on the footpath beneath, still breathing and sighing for another evening that is not theirs any more. Thoughtful walkers avoid stepping on them lest they cry out. Finches and mocking birds come out early to drink the nectar from the slender pout of their curved lips. And crows and mynas, sparrows and swallows come here to take a nap in the cool spaces and watch people hurry to their mundane chores and diverse callings, unaware of the blue beauties blooming a foot above their busy heads. We have no local name for this tree. Jacaranda itself is a melodious word. Thanks to Munir Niazi’s host, it is not so unknown now.
In his lifetime he was surrounded by infidelity, drunkenness, immorality, oppression, infanticide and exploitation. True religion had vanished and an admixture of idolatry and fetishism was prevailing everywhere. Above all, he had to face people who were immensely conservative, who would not tolerate any interference in their old customs and habits, and any admonition from any one. In such circumstances he worked tirelessly without compromising on the Divine principles of guidance.
Today when ritualism has overtaken the true spirit of Islam, we should remember that Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) made a strong faith in Allah and benevolence towards man, the essence of Islam. The Quran says “It is not righteousness that you turn your faces towards the East and the West but righteousness is that one should believe in Allah, the last day, the ‘malaika’, the Book and the Messengers, and give away wealth out of love for Him to the orphans, needy and the wayfarer” (2:177).
The Prophet never compelled anyone to become a Muslim. Through his exemplary behaviour people were drawn to him. He lived for forty years among the people before inviting them to Islam. It was quite difficult for them to accept a human being as a Nabi. He would plainly say that he was but a man like others, he had no treasures nor did he claim to know the secrets of the future. The Quran testifies to this “Say (O Muhammad) I am only a man like yourselves” (18:110).
The Arabs were a superstitious people. They were obsessed with the craving for the miraculous. They not only believed that the laws of nature could be violated, but regarded such a violation as the only proof that could be offered for the truth of prophethood. It was not easy to win over such people whose attitude to truth was so irrational. Had the Nabi so wished, he could have claimed any supernatural powers for himself.
Many incidents occurred in his lifetime when people would have ascribed divine powers to him, but he destroyed all such vain suggestions by a plain denial. It is stated that on the day of the death of his son, Ibrahim, a vivacious and lively child, there was a solar eclipse. The mourners said it eclipsed in bereavement. But the Nabi did not take advantage of such subterfuges and said “The sun and the moon are the signs of Allah. They do not eclipse for the death of any human being. He also braved the loss of his dear wife Khadija three years before the Hijrat (619 AD) and two of his other sons Qasim and Abdullah.
He always showed composure and balance while confronting the tribulations of life. The insistent demand of the people that he should work miracles to convince them made him despondent. On such occasions the Quran counselled him to remain firm and not give way of despair. Sometimes he might have thought that if only he possessed the power to work miracles he could have quickly persuaded the people to accept his teachings.
The Quran did not leave even such thought unanswered: “If their aversion to the truth is grievous to you, then if you can, seek a way down into the earth or a ladder into the sky that you may bring to them a sign. If Allah willed, he could have brought them all together to the guidance; so be not thou amongst those who are swayed by ignorance” (6:35). He occasionally grew impatient and felt frustrated when he came across people who were completely unresponsive to his words. The Quran counselled him to be patient, forgiving and tolerant.
The Quran also reminded him that the purpose of Wahi is not to compel man but to make him aware of the vices and virtues of life. Wahi imparts the requisite knowledge to man who is then free to act upon it or not. “Say: It is the truth from Allah then whosoever will let him believe, and whosoever will let him reject.” (18:29). He would always tell the people that Allah wants them to see and accept the truth through understanding and not dogmatically and irrationally. “Those who do not use their intellect, their matter remains confused to them” (10:100).
Allama Iqbal says: ‘The abolition of priesthood and hereditary kingship in Islam, the constant appeal to reason and experience in the Quran and the emphasis it lays on nature and history as sources of human knowledge, are all different aspects of the same idea of finality. The birth of Islam is the birth of inductive intellect.’
He changed the attitudes and characters of people through his own behaviour. He always led from the front and set an example to be followed by others. They were astonished to see reaction towards the citizens of Taif who had been very unkind and violent to him. He did not curse anyone, but prayed ‘May Allah guide the people of Taif’. Following the defeat at Uhud, the companions asked him to curse the Makkans, he said ‘I was not sent to curse people. I was sent as an inviter to the truth and as a mercy for the people.
As a model family man, the Nabi cleaned his clothes, mended his sandals, cleaned his house, kneaded the bread and hobbled the camels. He would sit with the people and eat with them. He was very loving to all the children and when the women complained that men managed to outspeak them in meetings, they were given due time to discuss. How many of us who claim to be followers and ‘Aashiq-e-Rasul’ practise these things.
Muhammad (PBUH) was successful in bringing into existence a new type of man — self-respecting, self-reliant, conscious of his worth and desirous of enhancing it and with the ambition to set up a better social order in the world. The astounding effect of Islamic values by the life of man was the strongest proof of its truth.
“Say, O my people! Work in your own way. I too am working. Thus you will come to know whose end will be (best). Certainly the wrong doers will not prosper” (6:135).
History fails to point out any personality other than him where we find the assemblage of all the virtues that constituted an evolved humanity. His simplicity, humanity, generosity, broadmindedness, forbearance, earnestness of purpose, steadfastness, firmness in adversity, meekness in power, humility in greatness, his anxious care for animals, his passionate love for children, his bravery and courage, his magnanimity, his unbending sense of justice are the values that need to be practised today.