Desperately Seeking Paradise: Journeys of a Sceptical Muslim

by Ziauddin Sardar

By the time the Brotherhood was transformed into a political organization in 1936, some of its members were already participating in uprisings against Zionist settlements in Palestine. Al-Banna

My alienation from FOSIS, and from the Islamic movement, centred around the question of absolute certainty. Doubts arose when The Muslim published the ‘unanimous verdict of the Pakistani ulema’ – a fatwa – that socialism is kufr (unbelief) and that ‘any help rendered to a socialist is haram’ (forbidden). The word kufr literally means ‘obliterating, covering’ or ‘concealing benefits received’ or being ‘ungrateful to God’. But in contemporary parlance kufr has also come to signify ‘the enemy’ and the term is often used to differentiate ‘Us’ from ‘Them’; to divide the world into two perpetually warring blocs. I just did not, could not, see the world in such black and white terms.

However, the absolute certainty of the brothers influenced by the movement led them to declare that associating with kufr was itself kufr. There was even a new kufr, thundered an article in The Muslim, the kufr of condoning kufr: ‘The choice is very plain. One is either on “good terms” with Allah and His faithful servants, or on good terms with kufr … The division is clear-cut and cannot be blurred or smudged: Islam and kufr, like light and darkness, cannot coexist in the same place.’ Not for these brothers the reality of quantum space, the reality of my world, the one I inhabit across belongings, of being everywhere at one and the same time. I

‘all the heads of all the countries of the world today, including the Muslim countries, are kuffar [unbelievers]. They, as well as all others who freely associate with them, aiding and abetting them in ruling contrary to what Allah has directed, and those who fail to denounce them as such, are all disbelievers, oppressors and debauched.’

‘To gain this world is humiliation; and to achieve the next world, the Hereafter, is honour. What do you prefer: humiliation or honour?’

He now started to call himself Sheikh Abdul Qadir. He declared he had authorization – Idhn – from his guru, Sheikh Muhammad ibn al-Habib in Morocco. Then he announced further authorization from a certain Sheikh Muhammad al-Fayturi Hamudah who ‘by his authority had joined together the two separate branches of the Habibiyya and the Alawiyya Orders in the Darqawiyya Order’. Abdul Qadir was now the Muqaddim – the representative – of this Order in the West. ‘Allah has singled me out with sciences and secrets which only the unique man of Muhammad possesses.’ In recognition, his name became Sheikh Abdul Qadir as-Sufi. The

book on the life of the Prophet Muhammad by Qadi Ayad. He was electrified, for the book represented a picture of Islam that was ‘all but obliterated by two thousand years of corrupted religious scholars from every direction’. It presented ‘the best and purest Islam’ as opposed to ‘Jew-tolerant’ westernized Islam.

During the next few weeks I visited several research institutions and talked to numerous scientists. I sampled the atmosphere of approaching storm in the north and the south of the city. I engaged with civil servants, the merchants in the bazaar, and professors, writers and thinkers in the universities. Everyone talked of the coming revolution in hushed tones. The overwhelming majority of people I spoke to were convinced it would usher in perfect justice and equity; and build a divine paradise on earth.

I wanted to linger in the bazaar and let my thoughts wander through the realities of an earlier global economy, the trading world before upstart Europe determined it must control and own everything.

The Director read the letter carefully, wrote something on it and asked Shaikh Abdullah to take it to a particular window outside the building. The window was actually a small opening in a very large wall. It was about eighty by fifty centimetres, protected with five iron bars some ten centimetres apart. Through them about a dozen individuals were simultaneously trying to pass files and talk to the man inside. My heart sank at the spectacle: forget the visa, I thought; we won’t even get near the window. Shaikh Abdullah sensed my thought and gently tapped me on the shoulder. ‘I know my job,’ he said with some confidence. ‘Now, stay back and watch.’ He counted off a number of paces from the crowd surrounding the visa window like a fast bowler preparing his run-up. At about twenty metres from the crowd he stopped, turned and shouted for two or three people standing between him and the crowd at the window to move out of the way. He then pulled up the bottom half of his toupe, his long white outer garment, and tied it around his waist. Finally, he looked at me and grinned, revealing the gold tooth at the bottom corner of his mouth. Suddenly Shaikh Abdullah yelled, ‘Ya Allah,’ in a dreadful voice and charged the crowd with the look of an Afghan Mujahid running into battle. The people gathered at the window turned in horror, unable to believe what was about to hit them. Shaikh Abdullah jumped on top of the crowd, walked at lightning speed on their heads and shoulders and placed h...

The Wahhabism they learned was manufactured on the basis of tribal loyalty – but the place of traditional tribal allegiance was now taken by Islam. Everyone outside this territory was, by definition, a hostile dweller in the domain of unbelief. Those who stood outside their domain were not limited to non-Muslims; they included all those Muslims who have not given allegiance to Wahhabism. The ranks of unbelief were swollen by the Shias, the Sufis, and followers of other Islamic schools of thought. In the minds of these dias, and in Saudi society itself, the demarcation between the interior and the exterior, with us or against us, insider or outsider, orthodox or heretic, is almost total. The students would often tell me that any alliance with the unbelievers was itself unbelief; that one should not just refrain from associating or making friends with them, but should also shun their employment, advice, emulation, and try to avoid conviviality and affability towards them.

Islam cannot be brought about in any country following the democratic method. And revolution has its own dynamics. You have to accept that.’

In another lecture, Al-Faruqi argued that the divisions within the ummah, particularly between Arab and other Muslim communities, were created by the West. There was no difference between ‘Arabic’ and ‘Islamic’ identities, he argued; and all Muslims from different ethnic backgrounds and political persuasions must unite to struggle against the decay and degeneration of the ummah.

Muslims love converts, and actively seek to make them; it confirms their own convictions and soothes their lurking insecurities.

The word Shariah literally means ‘the path or the road leading to water’. In its religious use, it is the path that leads to God and thus to paradise.

One student, a rather slim Pakistani in his twenties, had been keenly listening to our conversation. He came forward to introduce himself when the teacher had left. ‘Are you a Shia?’ he asked after the standard salutation. ‘No,’ I replied. ‘Shias are not Muslim,’ he said without hesitation. ‘They do not belong in a truly Islamic republic. We should have a pure leader – an Amir – who imposes the total Shariah of God on Pakistan.’ I did not reply; but looked at him passively. ‘Are you a good Muslim?’ he asked. ‘I am a Muslim,’ I replied, ‘I am not sure about the good bit.’ ‘If you are a Muslim why don’t you have a beard?’ ‘Because it is not necessary to have a beard to be a Muslim.’ ‘It is the Sunnah (the tradition derived from the customary practice) of the Prophet. A man who does not follow the Sunnah of the Prophet is not a Muslim.’ ‘So why aren’t you riding a camel?’ He was startled at my reply. ‘What do you mean?’ ‘It’s Sunnah to ride a camel. The Prophet spent a great deal of his life on the back of a camel.’ ‘But today we have cars and buses.’ ‘Well,’ I answered, ‘if blades had been available in his time, I am sure the Prophet would have used them.’ I looked at him to see if I could detect the hint of a smile. He lowered his gaze and kept quiet. ‘I notice that you are wearing surma,’ I said. ‘Yes. It is Sunnah.’ ‘But do you know that it contains lead? It could damage your eyes and poison you.’ He kept quiet. ‘Many things the Prophet did were a product of his times. I ...

Masters of the technique have achieved a wide range of success by releasing waiqi [outside breath] into sick people.’ A long queue had formed. I joined the queue. ‘You don’t have to stand in the queue,’ Aisha said, pulling my hand. ‘I will do waiqi on you. What are friends for?’ I liked the idea. ‘Sure,’ I mumbled. And let her have her way with me. I was made to sit comfortably on a chair in a quiet corner of the lobby. She covered my face with the palms of her hands and began to move her hands, very slowly, towards my chest and then lower parts of my body. Her hands never actually touched me, they were always a centimetre or two above the surface. She asked me to close my eyes and continued the process for over forty minutes, moving to my legs, and up again, to my back and down to the toes. When she finished I had a tingling feeling throughout my body. I felt refreshed and warm. And hungry.