Islam: The Arab National
Movement
ISLAM
The Arab National Movement
by Anwar Shaikh
CHAPTER 1
NATIONALISM, The Basic Element of Prophethood
Islam is an offshoot of the Semitic culture, which is an
expression of man's aggressive behaviour.
Semitism, as a culture, describes the way of life associated with
the peoples fathered by Shem, the eldest son of Noah. Originally,
the expression Semite included the Babylonians, Assyrians,
Aramaeans, Canaanites and Pnoenicians but now it refers to the two
major groups: the Jews and the Arabs, who have a common ancestry
and cultural traditions though religious differences depict them
in different colours, which give them ethnic distinction based on
mutual dislike, destruction and derogation. This might not have
happened but the Jewish sense of racial superiority coupled with
their brilliant success in worldly affairs, has ignited the flame
of jealousy provoking most nations to bruise, bash and batter them
during the course of history.
Paradoxically, what unites the Jews and the Arabs culturally also
serves as the foundation-stone of their ethnic animosity. This
happens to be the doctrine of Revelation, which is the oldest
tradition of the Semitic lands. It has a deeper meaning than what
is usually understood. The concept of revelation is the pivot of
the Semitic culture and governs the entire life of its people.
Revelation means that the universe has been created by God who
loves to be worshipped. He reveals His will to mankind through his
agent, called the prophet, who happens to be the divine
interpreter. Salvation is not possible unless people obey the
prophet who is God's messenger, however, customarily, it meant
that every locality, city and country, such as Sumer, Babylon,
etc., had a God as its head, who was represented by the local or
national priest-ruler. It was God who made laws and revealed to
the ruler, and gave him instructions regarding the government and
morality, that is, how people should talk, walk, eat, drink,
sleep, wake up, etc. The ruler was supposed to be God's servant,
who had no power of his own; he was there just to execute God's
will. The Islamic principle that government belongs to God and
must be conducted according to His law, is an extension of this
old Semitic tradition.
Since this tradition forms the cornerstone of the Semitic culture,
I may give a few examples to emphasise its significance: An
inscription of Shalmaneser 111 (858-824 B.C.) states how he fought
an alliance of twelve kings who wanted to destroy him. Shalmaneser,
"the mighty king of Assyria," describes himself as
"the priest of Assur, the great lord, king of all great
gods" who gave him "the exalted might" to
annihilate his enemies at Karkar including 10,000 soldiers of
Ahab, the Israelite.
A still better example is that of Marduk, the chief god of the
city of Babylon and the national god of Babylonia. He had fifty
names, each referring to a different attribute of his. It was
believed that he created all nature including man, and it was he
who controlled the destiny of kings and their subjects. The rulers
of Assyria and Persia also honoured Marduk.
Marduk was the son of Ea. He attained chief godhead by slaying
Tiamat, the monster. The famous rivers Tigris and Euphrates flowed
forth from the eyes of the monster when he pierced them. The chief
god had under him an array of minor gads, who were entrusted with
various functions. For example, Utu, the sun-god, was also the
judge of the gods and controlled justice and righteousness. As a
result, when people had complaints against demons, they went to
the law courts against the evil spirits to seek recourse before
Utu to obtain judgement against them, and not from the presiding
judge.
Similarly, the famous Babylonian code known as the laws of
Hammurabi, were the legal decisions of this king. They were
collected during the end of his reign and inscribed on a diorite
stela set up in Babylon's temple of the god Marduk. These man-made
laws were promulgated to have been revealed by Marduk, and
Hammurabi was shown in various statues, as receiving them directly
from the local deity.
This custom of the Semitic dignitaries acting as God's viceroys
was maintained masterfully; firstly, the deity was assigned
incredible powers and attributes to frighten people into
submission. Here is a hymn to the God, Merodach ( Marduk ), which
is the translation of an Akkadian Psalm. The author claims that it
was composed 3000 B.C.
Who shall escape from before thy power?
thy will is an eternal mystery!
Thou makest it plain in heaven
and in the earth.
Command the sea
and the sea obeyeth thee.
Command the tempest
and the tempest becometh a calm.
Command the winding course
of the Euphrates
and the will of Merodach
shall arrest the floods.
Lord, thou art holy!
Who is like unto thee?
Merodach thou art honoured
among the gods that bear a name.
Secondly, these priest-kings, the early equivalents of prophets
and messiahs went a long way to express that they had no desire to
rule; they did so under the command of the god and acted as his
vicar; they were only performing their duty as laid upon them by
the Lord. Thus, they made their government look impersonal, yet it
was their government in the cloak of revelation. They did what
they liked but without much danger of rebellion because God was
always on hand to be blamed. The innovation of acting as God's
servant under duress is the fulcrum of the device of revelation,
which I ought to explain with reference to two major prophets,
namely Moses and Muhammad. Jesus Christ is yet another man in this
category but as the details of his life are minimal and highly
controversial, it will serve no purpose to describe him here.
A closer study of the doctrine of revelation shows that a prophet
has two ambitions: personal and national. Personally, he
despevately wants to be loved and worshipped as God but without
being called so.
Nationally, he adores his nation and strives for its superiority
and preservation. It is quite natural for him to use his
leadership qualities for the amelioration of his racial group with
which he is connected culturally i.e. he speaks their language,
dresses like them, practises their customs, manners and rites,
belongs to the same country with similar patriotic feelings and
possesses a temperament and psychological attitude verisimilar to
those of his countrymen. He is usually a refined man, wiser than
most and endowed with leading qualities. Thus, he knows that there
is no such thing as a leader without the led, and the greatness of
the leader depends upon the quality of his followers. Therefore,
he is also a national leader of great virtue who is dedicated to
the elevation of his own country and people.
Let us take the Jews first, and see how these facts apply to
Moses:
Moses, the founder of Judaism, was the son of Amram and Jochebed.
By a quirk of history, he ended up on the lap of Pharaoh's
daughter and was brought up in the Egyptian court as a prince. He
was trained in the noble arts of Egypt such as law-making,
scribing, religion, civil administration and warfare. Moreover, as
Egypt ruled Palestine and a part of Syria, he knew the history and
geography of these countries from the court records.
Originally, the total numher of Jews or Israelites, who went to
live in Egypt (including Joseph) was seventy-one. The Egyptians
were extremely cruel to them, and they had to leave Egypt after an
abode of four hundred and thirty years. The size of the exodus has
been put as high as 2,000,000 though scholarly criticism has
reduced it to 15,000. However, I estimated it at half a million in
my book: Eternity.
Though at that time, the Jews were a loose ethnic group, almost
all of them came from the conquered territories of Canaan
(Palestine) and Syria. This is evident from the fact that
Amenhotep ll (1450-1425 B.C., took during his nine- year campaign
89,600 prisoners, who were used as slaves to build Egyptian
temples.
These Hebrews or Jews were a rabble of slavish habits,
psychologically depressed and having hardly any cultural
attainment. Moses was a great man; he identified himself with the
Hebrews. Having been raised as a prince, he wanted to maintain his
dominant position and needed a nation to remember him and spread
his name. Thus, he chose the ancient Semitic tradition of
revelation to project himself as a prophet to unite his nation
behind him. The superstitious mind of the Hebrews was receptive to
such an idea to give them self-confidence and protection against
the uncertainties of life.
On the Semitic model of a prophet mediating between God and man,
he narrated the story of the burning bush ( Exodus 3: 2 ) and to
give it supernatural character, he emphasised that the bush though
burnt, suffered no consumption at all. It was the genius of Moses
which realised that the introduction of the God of Israel, who
happened to be the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, must be
accompanied by such an uncanny event.
At the same time, he remembered to tell his people that he did not
want to be their leader but was acting under duress. Moses told
God (Exodus 4: 10; Exodus 3: 8) that he was not willing to be the
divine viceroy owing to his stammer and lack of eloquence.
However, he agreed to carry the yoke of authority because his
attitude infuriated the Lord. Thus. Moses had no choice but to
become God's viceroy and announce that God had sent him to His
people. One can see the old Semitic tradition at work here: first,
Moses finds a God for the people and then appoints himself as
God's messenger to enforce certain commands in the name of God.
This God is the God of Israel. He is called Yahwe, who, following
the Hittite manners, does not reveal his name and declares "I
Am That I Am."
Of course, according to the Semitic believers, it is a great
honour to be appointed as god's messenger but it is not like a
postman. God's messenger is God's servant in name only. In
practice, he is God's superior. This exposes the nature of
revelation because it makes this device the tool of dominance.
Here is an example from the Old Testament:
As the story goes, worship of the molten calf by the Jews kindled
Yahwe's jealousy. He appears in His divine glory and intends to
consume the Children of Israel with His boiling wrath. Here is a
chance for Moses to establish his superiority over God. He tells
Yahwe impolitely that He is about to do a wicked thing against His
own people and shames Him by asserting what the Egyptians would
say if He destroyed them. After all, Yahwe had gone out of the way
to secure the release of the Jews from Egypt.
Moses commands the Lord to refrain from this evil and repent.
(Exodus 32: 12-14). What an event it becomes; God surrenders to
man! Yet the Jews call their faith strictly monotheistic.
This is not the only occasion when Moses, the Prophet, humiliates
God in front of everybody. There is yet another episode of similar
nature when the Jews denigrate the Promised Land and want to
return to Egypt. Yahwe's wrath reaches boiling point and He
threatens to kill them all. Moses steps in and shames Him
publicly. God Yields to Moses as usual ( Numbers 14: 1 1 - 20 ).
A prophet's urge of dominance is much stronger than that of a
secular suzerain; when a suzerain dies, his urge of dominance dies
with him but a prophet's urge of dominance, on the contrary,
becomes immortal; he wants to command people from the grave, and
desires to be worshipped exclusively because he warns people that
he was the last prophet and anyone declaring himself to be the
God's apostle after him, would be nothing but an imposter.
However, to be remembered and worshipped after one's death, is not
possible unless one i.e. the prophet leaves behind a devoted,
dedicated and determined band of followers. Such a band of
followers without a national character and sense of unity is just
a rabble, liable to disperse with the first sign of resistance.
This is the reason that a prophet has got to be a national leader,
openly or discreetly.
Moses, the Prophet, was an overt national leader. First of all, he
planned to secure for them a homeland, which he called the
"Promised Land." This was not possible without indulging
in warfare. His people, after a severe bondage of over four
centuries, suffered from an extreme slavish mentality which could
prove a great hurdle to self-confidence and independence. So he
subjected them to a severe miiitary discipline. For no fewer than
forty years, he toughened and trained them in a certain way of
life which eventually came to be known as "Judaism." As
the third generation of the wandering Jews emerged, Moses decided
to settle his followers in Canaan through a policy of fire and
genocide. The children of Israel rose to the occasion. They fought
to win and became a proud nation. They have followed, not only the
law of Moses, but have also made a generous contribution to the
world's civilisation.
As we can see, every person who seeks dominance as a prophet
through the device of revelation creates a god of his own, and
when another person aspires to be a prophet or messiah he has to
demolish the god of his competitor and erect the image of a new
god to establish his own prophethood to operate the device of
revelation. This truth is well illustrated by the examples of
Assur, Marduk and Yahwe. Yet nationalism is the most important
element of prophethood because it creates an organised group of
national fanatics to perpetuate his name by stratagem and force.
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